A long-running rift between the United States and the Islamic Republic of Iran has intensified since the 1979 Iranian revolution, when Islamic nationalists and ultraconservative Shia Muslim clerics overthrew the U.S.-backed Mohammad Reza Pahlavi, Iran’s last leader. king. His successor is Ayatollah Khomeini, a cleric who calls himself Iran’s supreme ruler. For nearly two decades, he was a critic of the Shah’s regime, even fomenting an uprising while in exile.
The two countries have a tumultuous relationship and both have expressed a great dislike for each other. Iranian leaders routinely chant “Death to America” while making it clear that they hate the leader, not the American people. In contrast, U.S. leaders see Iran as one of the main countries in the “axis of evil.”
But aside from diplomatic “insults,” the main reason their differences persist is that they disagree on certain issues. The U.S. government is extremely concerned about Iran’s uncompromising foreign policy. They condemned Iran’s overt and provocative support of terrorist groups, especially Hezbollah, Hamas and Shia militias in the region, and their lack of enthusiasm and hostility towards the Middle East peace process. Iran does not consider Israel a state and fully supports the Palestinians, who are also Shia Muslims. But the biggest sticking point for the United States is the advancement of Iran’s nuclear program. The United States suspects that Iran is trying to create weapons of mass destruction.
Iran, on the other hand, has refused to engage in formal dialogue with the United States until its concerns are addressed. They want the Americans to withdraw their entire military presence in the Persian Gulf. Iran will not agree to defund terrorist groups or dismantle its nuclear program, which Iranian officials say is used for medical purposes and to generate electricity, until the United Nations lifts current economic sanctions on Iran.
In order to force Iran to change its policy, the United Nations and many other countries led by the United States have imposed economic sanctions on Iran many times since 1979. These sanctions cover a wide range of products and services, and even include investments in Iran’s oil industry, banking, logistics and other fields. The Iranian economy, its people and their way of life have been severely affected.
Over the past 40 years, Iran has had unsuccessful talks with the West about its nuclear program. However, during the Obama administration, Iran agreed to limit its nuclear program for another decade, and in return the United Nations lifted sanctions in 2016. Two years later, President Trump reinstated them.
At the heart of the rift between the two countries, two contrasting views emerged: First, the United States is a modern-day exploitative imperialist state targeting Iran’s vast oil reserves to plunder the traditional Eastern nation. Second, Iran is a cruel and oppressive religious dictatorship masquerading as a victim of Western bullying and abuse.
We can only answer this debate by going back and analyzing their entire complex relationship in the context of: historical events, economic sanctions and factors, religious beliefs, fanaticism and fanaticism, the change of leadership between the two countries, liberalism and conservatism, Geopolitical diplomacy and manipulation and the threat of a nuclear bomb.
Director Graham Templeton
