‘They have a mystical value’: Why Iran won’t budge on its prized ballistic missiles

Reaching a deal to constrain Iran’s nuclear enrichment is an uphill battle.

Persuading the Islamic republic to rein in its ballistic missile program could be next to impossible, analysts say, with the weapons having achieved an almost “mystical” reputation among some Iranian military leaders who remember their key role in the Iran-Iraq war of the 1980s and now see them as vital to their country’s survival.

Iran’s ballistic missile arsenal — widely viewed as the largest, most advanced and most dangerous in the Middle East — has emerged as a critical flash point in negotiations between Tehran and the Trump administration. The U.S. wants a deal that not only imposes limits on the enrichment of uranium and other aspects of Iran’s nuclear program but also establishes unprecedented rules governing ballistic missiles, which are capable of delivering both conventional and nuclear warheads.

Iranian officials said they refused to put ballistic missiles on the table during recent talks with a high-level U.S. delegation. Those talks were established amid a heavy American military buildup in the Middle East and repeated threats by President Trump to launch another round of military strikes on Iran.

During a White House meeting Wednesday, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is expected to privately lobby Mr. Trump to insist that Iran’s ballistic missile capabilities be a part of negotiations. It’s an especially important issue for Israel, given that Iran’s medium- and long-range ballistic missiles can reach the Jewish state, evidenced by multiple Iranian missile attacks on Israel in 2024 and 2025.

Specialists say Iranian leadership, both at the political and military levels, places an almost incalculable value on its ballistic missile stockpile, currently estimated to be about 2,000. Scholars say the relative ease with which Israeli and U.S. warplanes were able to strike Iran last year only reinforced a belief inside Tehran — perhaps up to and including Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, the country’s supreme leader — that Iran cannot budge on its ballistic missile program and must guard it as a means of self-preservation in the event of major conflict.

Behnam Ben Taleblu, senior director of the Iran Program at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, said Iranian leaders view ballistic missiles as a way to level the playing field against potential foes and to make up for other military capabilities in which the country may be lacking.

“They already have a mystical value for this regime given their centrality to Iranian deterrence during the Iran-Iraq war,” he said in an interview. “It was that conflict that birthed Iran’s interest in ballistic missiles, and there is a straight line from that to the regime using ballistic missiles as a supplement to having a proper air force.

“It’s going to be very, very hard to impose meaningful constraints on Iran’s ballistic missile program,” Mr. Taleblu said. “For them, it’s a stock that is supposed to exponentially rise.”

In some ways, Iran’s commitment to and reliance on ballistic missiles have played out exactly as intelligence analysts predicted decades ago. A declassified 1986 CIA paper analyzing the Iran-Iraq war said: “On the basis of their efforts to acquire new missiles abroad and to improve their capabilities, we believe Iran and Iraq will try to obtain more accurate missiles with a range of up to 1,000 kilometers to threaten military, economic and civilian targets throughout the Middle East.”

Iran fired hundreds of ballistic missiles at Israel during three rounds of conflict in 2024 and 2025. The vast majority of those missiles were repelled by Israeli, U.S. and Jordanian defense systems, but some reached Israeli territory.

Ballistic missiles are powered by rockets in initial stages before taking an unpowered trajectory upward and eventually descending toward their targets, according to information from the Center for Arms Control and Non-Proliferation. They differ from cruise missiles, which are powered by engines for the entirety of their flight.

The range of ballistic missiles can vary dramatically, from a few hundred miles to well over 3,000. The longest-range class is known as intercontinental ballistic missiles, or ICBMs. A Defense Intelligence Agency report released last year said Iran could field up to 60 ICBMs by 2035.

Missiles off the table

The Trump administration has offered little detail on the meeting over the weekend with an Iranian delegation in Oman. The administration’s Middle East envoy, Steve Witkoff, led the U.S. team, which also included Mr. Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner and Adm. Brad Cooper, the head of U.S. Central Command. Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi led his country’s delegation.

After the meeting, Mr. Araghchi told the news outlet Al Jazeera that Iran’s ballistic missile program was “never negotiable” and that Iran was not willing to put that issue on the table during the round of talks. That was a striking position for Mr. Araghchi to take, given the massive influx of U.S. military assets into the Middle East and Mr. Trump’s proven willingness to strike Iran directly.

Mr. Trump ordered strikes against three Iranian nuclear facilities in June.

Mr. Araghchi said the most recent talks were a “good start” but signaled that no major breakthroughs were made.

“There is a long way to go to build trust,” he said, according to Al Jazeera.

Some specialists say Iran’s position could change during negotiations if the U.S. applies the right pressure.

“Iran can concede on its missiles. They are not fundamental to the regime. The only thing the regime cannot compromise on is ideology,” said former Defense Department official Michael Rubin, now a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute.

“They will never stop support for terrorism or seeking Israel’s destruction. They will never reconcile with the United States,” Mr. Rubin told The Washington Times. “But cause Iran enough pain, they will back down. That was the story of the release of U.S. hostages in 1981 and [Ayatollah] Khomeini’s acceptance of a ceasefire [with Iraq] in 1988. The issue for Trump is how to make the Iranian regime an offer they can’t refuse.”

How to verify?

If the U.S. and Iran somehow reach a deal that includes ballistic missiles, attention would then turn to how the terms could actually be enforced.

The International Atomic Energy Agency, an autonomous organization under the United Nations, oversees compliance with nuclear issues. IAEA inspectors were on the ground inside Iran in the years after the signing of the Obama-era Iran nuclear deal, but their efforts are restricted to nuclear-related matters.

It’s not clear who would enforce any U.S.-Iran deal on ballistic missiles, given that there is virtually no chance Iran would allow American inspectors into its territory to verify compliance.

“Arms control takes place between governments, and governments actually agree to limit, constrain or destroy certain capabilities or capacities. It is about trust,” Mr. Taleblu said. “I find it borderline impossible that the Islamic republic shares this information willingly with Washington.”

It’s difficult to pin down precise information on Iran’s current ballistic missile stockpiles, though the number is generally thought to be around 2,000.

Heavy Israeli military strikes last year are thought to have destroyed some of its capabilities. Iran expended hundreds of its ballistic missiles during its attacks on Israel. It’s not clear how many were replaced.

During the Israel-Iran conflict last year, Israel is thought to have destroyed hundreds of Iranian ballistic missiles still sitting on their transporter-erector-launchers, or TELs, the mobile launchers used to transport missiles.

Estimates suggest that Iran began the war with 480 TELs and ended it with only about 100, said Can Kasapoglu, a senior fellow at the Hudson Institute.