Pakistan says progress was made in Tehran, but Iran’s security establishment remains wary of Washington.
Islamabad, Pakistan — Pakistani Field Marshal Asim Munir spent Monday moving through the power corridors of Tehran: the presidency, parliament, the Supreme National Security Council, and the foreign and interior ministries.
He met Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian, as well as Parliament Speaker Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf, who is Tehran’s chief negotiator in talks with the United States to end their now six-month-long war.
But amid a deadlock in those peace negotiations, many analysts say that Munir’s true test as mediator will lie in his ability to use his position as one of the region’s most powerful military leaders to convince his Iranian counterparts in olive uniforms to agree to a return to talks with Washington.
Days before Munir’s visit, Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian told a gathering of doctors in Tehran that it was time to end the war while Iran held the advantage, a message aimed as much at Tehran’s own security establishment as at Washington.
“It is better that we bring the war to an end now as we are in a position of power and dignity,” he said, adding that “the whole world acknowledges our victory”.
Hours later, on August 21, the chief of the general staff of Iran’s armed forces, Major-General Ali Abdollahi, promised “revolutionary, crushing, regret-inducing and devastating” responses to any American miscalculation.
It was a sharp illustration of the gap between Iran’s president and the men now running its military — one that Munir will need to also navigate, analysts say.
And that’s why Munir’s most significant meeting on Monday might have been with General Mohsen Rezaei, a representative of Iran’s Supreme Leader Mojtaba Khamenei and the newly appointed secretary of the Supreme National Security Council. Rezaei is essentially the bridge between the military and Khamenei.
State of the war
Munir’s visit to Tehran came on a day when the region and the world were bracing for US President Donald Trump’s threatened “economic D-Day” sanctions against Iran, accompanied by a threatened punishment for all countries that continue to trade with Tehran.
Later in the day, US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent unveiled “Operation Economic Outcast“, a sweeping sanctions campaign targeting Iran’s digital assets, gold, aviation, technology and shipping networks.
But while warning other countries to sever trade ties with Iran, he held back from actually announcing any penalties for those nations, acknowledging that such a step would “blow up the global financial system”.
Meanwhile, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, speaking the same day, kept the option of renewed strikes open.
“If we need to use kinetic strikes, we’ll use them. If Iran is foolish enough to overplay their hand or mess with the American military, we’ll do what we need to do,” he said.
It’s unclear whether Munir’s visit helped stave off broader US action against Iran and its trading partners.
But the timing was significant, analysts point out. Munir travelled to Tehran days after taking a phone call from United States President Donald Trump, who reportedly asked Islamabad to use its influence to bring Iran back to the table.
Pakistan’s Inter-Services Public Relations (ISPR) said the one-day visit had produced “comprehensive discussions” on reopening the Strait of Hormuz and ending the war.
Iranian officials, the ISPR added, “appreciated Pakistan’s constructive role and sincere efforts”.
Pakistan’s Interior Minister Mohsin Naqvi, who travelled with Munir, went further, calling the talks “very positive and productive” and saying “significant progress was made”.
A reshuffled Iranian military
This was his fourth visit to Tehran this year, but his first since Iran’s military hierarchy changed earlier this month.
It is these military men that analysts say are now shaping Iran’s war moves, potentially giving a fellow man in uniform an edge over traditional diplomats in convincing Tehran to get back to talks.
“It is increasingly the IRGC and the wider security establishment driving decisions on war and peace during this crisis,” Ahmed Saeed, a former vice admiral in Pakistan’s navy and a defence analyst, told Al Jazeera.
Naqvi, the interior minister, has travelled to Tehran eight times since April without those visits producing a substantial breakthrough.
But unlike him, Munir is not a politician. He’s a general who appears to enjoy the trust of both the Iranian leadership and, crucially, Trump — who has described the Pakistani army chief as his “favourite field marshal”.
“The call [to Munir a few days ago] was initiated by Trump himself, requesting Pakistani leadership use its influence to bring Iran back to the table,” Saeed said.
Warm words, no movement
What Iranian officials actually told Munir, in accounts carried by Iranian state media, differed little from what they have been telling their own broadcasters all week.
“We distrust America, and it must change its behaviour,” Rezaei told Munir, according to IRNA.
Ghalibaf, Iran’s parliament speaker, was blunter.
“We are pursuing the implementation of the terms of the Memorandum of Understanding, and it is America that must adhere to its commitments based on the Memorandum of Understanding,” he told Munir, according to IRNA.
Pezeshkian, meanwhile, pressed Munir to tell Washington to “correct its tone and approach”, warning that “relying on force and bullying will only complicate the process”, according to Tasnim, another Iranian outlet.
Two tracks, one strait
Oman’s Foreign Minister Badr bin Hamad Albusaidi is also expected in Tehran today for a separate round of talks focused specifically on the Strait of Hormuz, a track that has run alongside Pakistan’s mediation for months.
Oman’s involvement is not new. Albusaidi has held recurring talks with Tehran on the strait’s navigation rules.
Ejaz Haider, a Lahore-based defence analyst, said the Omani and Pakistani diplomatic tracks complement each other.
“Oman and Islamabad channels complement, because clause 5 of the Islamabad MoU stresses a bilateral understanding on the strait [between Oman and Iran],” he told Al Jazeera. The Strait of Hormuz passes through the territorial waters of Iran and Oman.
“This [a deal between Iran and Oman to jointly manage the strait] is not in the interest of the US, which is why Trump has threatened to bomb Oman,” Haider said, referring to remarks Trump made on August 17, when he told Fox News he would bomb Oman if it “gets in the way” of reopening the strait, the second time he had threatened the US ally over Hormuz.
Where Islamabad’s advantage as a mediator lay was in its “direct access to Vahidi, Abdollahi and Rezaei, the actual architects of Iran’s decision-making”, Saeed, the former naval official, said.
An Iranian official close to the negotiations, speaking on condition of anonymity, said Albusaidi would be in Tehran “primarily to hear what Iran has decided and what it has discussed with its Pakistani mediator”.
Who holds the leverage?
Andreas Krieg, an associate professor of defence studies at King’s College London, said the differences that had emerged between the Iranian military and civilian leaderships demonstrate a gulf between their understanding of where the war stood.
Pezeshkian and Ghalibaf, Krieg said, were “essentially warning that Iran cannot live indefinitely in this condition”, while “parts of the IRGC believe the opposite and think time is working against Washington”.
But ultimately, he said, “Mohsen Rezaei, Ahmad Vahidi and the IRGC are central to whether any political understanding [to end the war] can be implemented”, referring to Iran’s top military leadership.
“[Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas] Araghchi can negotiate something, and Qatar can broker it, but none of that matters if the security apparatus does not accept the operational consequences.”
For now, Munir appears to be the candidate mediators believe has the best shot at getting Iranian generals from their war room to the board room.