Troubled History of U.S.-Iran Relations

Lawrence Korb provides some historical context on U.S.-Iran relations and the importance of keeping these past incidents in mind as the United States considers its next steps with Iran.

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As President Trump and his advisers contemplate the next steps to take in the conflict he instigated with Iran, they are focused primarily on two historical events. First, the seizure of the 52 American hostages at our embassy in Iran in 1979 and Iran’s role in killing hundreds of our troops after our invasion and occupation of Iraq.

In fact, the president has said that if Iran takes military action against us or our allies, he has a list of 52 high-level targets that are important to Iran and Iranian culture that he would destroy because that is the number of Americans who were held hostage for 440 days in Tehran from 1979 to 1981. Similarly, when justifying our killing of Gen. Qassem Soleimani, the president and his secretary of state have constantly pointed out that the general was responsible for the killing of about 800 American military personnel in Iraq after our invasion.

The above excerpt was originally published in InsideSources. Click here to view the full article.

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