Overview
- The disclosure Sunday revealed that Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard asked Kurdistan Regional Government president Nechirvan Barzani to test whether IRGC commander Gen. Ahmad Vahidi backed Iran’s civilian negotiating team.
- Barzani arranged a secure exchange on May 14 in Erbil in which an IRGC official delivered an encrypted phone and Vahidi said the IRGC supported the negotiators and preferred a negotiated settlement.
- After Barzani relayed Vahidi’s confirmation to Gabbard and the White House, U.S. officials asked him to host secret U.S.-Iran talks in Erbil, but Iranian security concerns over possible Israeli targeting scuttled the meeting.
- Those backchannel exchanges helped produce a memorandum of understanding in June that quickly collapsed, and Pakistani and Qatari mediators have since carried the stalled communications while Barzani has offered to help restart talks.
- The episode illustrates how targeted strikes and wartime disruption have strengthened the IRGC’s role in Iranian policy, leaving Washington dependent on regional intermediaries and constrained by real risks to diplomats and commanders.