WASHINGTON/NEW DELHI — Following the standard diplomatic protocol of increasing the duration of a proposal every time it is ignored, U.S. and regional mediators have transitioned from a rejected 48-hour ceasefire to a 45-day ‘two-phased’ cooling-off period, sources confirmed Monday.

The new proposal, reportedly facilitated by Pakistan and China, suggests a six-week window during which both sides would pause the process of shooting down each other's aircraft to discuss the possibility of not shooting down aircraft at all. The shift comes just days after Tehran dismissed a two-day pause as ‘insufficiently long to be worth the paperwork,’ according to semi-official sources in Tehran.

“We are moving from the ‘weekend-at-home’ model to the ‘summer-vacation’ model of conflict management,” said one State Department official speaking on condition of anonymity. “If they reject 45 days, we are prepared to offer a 90-day ‘Autumn of Reflection.’ Our strategy is to keep adding days until the war simply runs out of calendar.”

President Trump, writing on Truth Social, characterized the move as a total capitulation by the Iranian regime. “Iran’s New Regime President—very smart, very intelligent, loves me—has basically begged for 45 days of peace so he can figure out how to open the Strait of Hormuz without looking weak! I told him we’ll consider it, but in the meantime, we are blasting them back to the Stone Age (Beautiful Rocks!) if they touch another F-15!”

The ‘Stone Age’ reference follows the confirmed loss of a U.S. F-15E Strike Eagle over Iran’s Khuzestan province last Friday. Pentagon officials noted that while the aircraft is currently in several thousand pieces, the pilot is ‘receiving medical attention’ and the weapon systems officer is ‘part of a collaborative search-and-rescue effort’ involving several Iranian radar units.

In New Delhi, analysts noted that the 45-day window is strategically timed to allow global oil markets to stabilize just long enough for speculators to bet on the war resuming on day 46. The Strait of Hormuz, which remains ‘effectively closed’ to everything except ballistic metaphors, has triggered what economists call the worst energy shock since humans discovered that fire costs money.

“The 45-day plan is a masterpiece of bureaucratic physics,” said a Ministry Correspondent in New Delhi. “It creates a ‘Phase One’ which is just a pause, and a ‘Phase Two’ which is a meeting to schedule a Phase Three. By the time Phase Three arrives, the original reasons for the war will have been replaced by several newer, more exciting reasons.”

At press time, Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi clarified that ‘reviewing’ the 45-day proposal should not be confused with ‘negotiating,’ ‘talking,’ or ‘acknowledging the existence’ of the United States, but rather constitutes a ‘prolonged exchange of signals via neutral third parties who are also currently screaming.’”