Mainstream political commentary loves a predictable narrative. When a political figure uses aggressive, unscripted language regarding international treaties—such as threatening to walk away from agreements or invoking the prospect of military escalation—the media establishment immediately sounds the alarm. They dissect the rhetoric as a sign of instability, an impulsive shift in strategy, or a breakdown of diplomatic norms.
They are missing the point entirely.
What conventional analysts treat as erratic behavior is actually a textbook application of brinkmanship and bargaining theory. In international relations, predictability is an asset only when you possess overwhelming leverage. When you do not, strategic ambiguity and the deliberate projection of irrationality become your strongest tools. The lazy consensus views hardline rhetoric as a dangerous departure from diplomacy, failing to realize that the rhetoric itself is an essential phase of the negotiation.
The Rationality of Irrationality
To understand why aggressive posturing works, you have to look at game theory, specifically Thomas Schelling’s "rationality of irrationality" concept. Schelling, a Nobel Prize-winning economist, argued that a negotiator can strengthen their position by convincing the opposing party that they are volatile enough to take actions that would mutually assure destruction.
If an adversary believes you will only act in a perfectly measured, predictable, and risk-averse manner, they can calculate your exact breaking point. They will push right up to that line, knowing you will concede rather than risk a disruption.
- Predictable diplomacy creates a ceiling for what you can achieve.
- Calculated volatility forces the adversary to calculate the cost of your potential overreaction, shifting the risk burden onto them.
I have spent decades analyzing geopolitical risk and corporate negotiations. The mechanics are identical. In high-stakes corporate restructuring, the negotiator who is willing to let the company go into bankruptcy often walks away with the best terms from the creditors. The moment the creditors know you are terrified of Chapter 11, they own you. In statecraft, the principle is amplified by the presence of military capabilities.
Deconstructing the JCPOA and Threat Inflation
Let us look at the actual mechanics of the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), commonly known as the Iran nuclear deal, and the subsequent strategy of "maximum pressure." The orthodox view holds that the deal was a delicate masterpiece of multilateral diplomacy that was needlessly jeopardized by aggressive rhetoric and unilateral withdrawal.
The contrarian reality is that the JCPOA was structurally flawed from its inception because it relied on fixed expiration dates—the so-called "sunset clauses." By the mid-2020s, several of these restrictions on Iran's nuclear infrastructure were already set to expire. The agreement did not permanently solve a crisis; it bought time while guaranteeing a future escalation under altered geopolitical conditions.
+------------------------------------+----------------------------------------+
| Conventional Diplomatic Assumption | Geopolitical Reality |
+------------------------------------+----------------------------------------+
| Treaties are permanent solutions. | Treaties are temporary holding patterns.|
| Volatile language destroys trust. | Volatile language resets leverage. |
| Multilateral consensus is mandatory. | Multilateral consensus creates inertia. |
+------------------------------------+----------------------------------------+
When a leader states that they will "go back to shooting" or abandon a deal if they dislike it, they are not announcing a desire for war. They are signaling that the status quo is no longer acceptable and that the cost of non-negotiation has risen significantly for the other side.
Consider the historical precedent of the 1972 Strategic Arms Limitation Talks (SALT I) between the United States and the Soviet Union. The negotiations succeeded not because both sides were polite, but because the Nixon administration deliberately cultivated an image of unpredictability through the "Madman Theory." The Soviet leadership believed Nixon might take extreme measures, which forced them to the negotiating table in a way that standard diplomatic overtures never could.
The Flawed Premise of "People Also Ask"
If you look at public discourse surrounding international sanctions and deal-making, the questions being asked are fundamentally wrong. People want to know: Do sanctions actually change regime behavior? or Does aggressive rhetoric alienate traditional allies?
These questions assume that the primary goal of foreign policy is consensus-building or immediate behavioral correction. It is not. The primary goal is the management of long-term strategic competition.
Answering the first question honestly: Sanctions rarely force a complete regime capitulation on their own. However, that is a baseline misunderstanding of their utility. Sanctions are designed to degrade an adversary's economic capacity over time, restricting their ability to fund proxy conflicts or develop advanced military hardware. The rhetoric surrounding the sanctions serves to deter third-party corporations from violating them.
Answering the second question: Yes, aggressive rhetoric alienates allies who prefer stability over disruption. But alliances are not friendships; they are calculations of mutual interest. When a dominant superpower changes its stance, allies inevitably adjust their behavior to align with the new reality, regardless of their public complaints.
The Hidden Costs of the Disruption Strategy
A truly objective analysis requires admitting the severe downsides of using volatility as a diplomatic weapon. It is a high-wire act with zero margin for error.
- Miscalculation: The greatest danger is that an adversary reads your calculated volatility as an absolute promise of imminent strike, triggering a preemptive attack.
- Diminishing Returns: If you threaten to walk away from deals repeatedly but never actually do, or if you threaten military action without ever executing it, the leverage evaporates. The "madman" simply becomes a bluffer.
- Economic Whiplash: International markets despise unpredictability. Sharp rhetorical shifts create immediate volatility in energy markets, supply chains, and sovereign debt risks.
I witnessed this firsthand during the trade renegotiations of the late 2010s. Supply chain executives spent millions shifting manufacturing hubs out of certain regions based purely on escalating rhetoric, only for agreements to be signed months later. The collateral damage to private enterprise is real, even if the geopolitical objective is achieved.
The Mechanics of the Reset
When a competitor's article fixates on a specific quote about "shooting" or breaking deals, they are falling for the theater. They are analyzing the script instead of the stage mechanics.
International agreements are not sacred texts; they are reflections of the balance of power at the exact moment they were signed. When the balance of power shifts—via economic growth, technological advancement, or new regional alliances—the underlying treaties must either adapt or fracture.
Aggressive rhetoric is the mechanism by which a state forces a renegotiation when the formal bureaucratic channels refuse to move. It bypasses the entrenched diplomatic apparatus that profits from maintaining the status quo, even when that status quo is actively detrimental to national security interests.
Stop analyzing foreign policy through the lens of interpersonal decorum. Stop expecting nations to behave like polite committees in a boardroom. The international arena remains an anarchic system where leverage is the only true currency, and the willingness to destroy a bad deal is the only way to secure a better one.
The next time a headline screams about a leader threatening to tear up an international agreement, ignore the panic. Look at who holds the economic leverage, look at who stands to lose the most if the system breaks, and recognize the performance for what it is: the opening salvo of a new negotiation.
