Lasting effects The crisis in 1979 began a string of U.S. legal action, or economic sanctions against Iran, that further weakened relations and economic ties between Iran and the United States. It also strengthened the belief in and the political power of the Ayatollah and those who support an Islamic theocracy and opposed "Western" influence and relations.
"Khomeini's death in 1989 did nothing to ease the enmity between Iran and the U.S., at least on an official level. As Iranians—particularly the Westward-looking middle class—grew more frustrated with the oppressiveness of the revolution, they began to view America more favorably. Today, Iran may be the only Mideast nation with a government—now led by Ayatollah Ali Khamenei (hah-mehn-a-EE) and President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad (ah-ma-DIH-nee-jahd)—that is more anti-American than its people." -NYTimes Scholastic |
A nuclear Iran?"This is the context in which the current confrontation between the West and Iran over the country's nuclear ambitions, and its support of militant Islamic groups like Hezbollah in Lebanon, should be seen.
Iran wants a nuclear weapon for several reasons. Above all, the nuclear program, which Iran claims is for civilian energy purposes, represents an assertion of power at a time when surging oil revenues have emboldened Iran's leaders. Iran stirs up trouble for America wherever it can, most recently through Hezbollah's attacks on Israel. (Ahmadinejad has said that "Israel must be wiped off the map" and that the Holocaust never happened). In Iraq, Iran now has a direct channel to the Shiites who came to power after the fall of Saddam Hussein. Will relations between Iran and the U.S. ever improve? Iran remains a repressive regime built around an anti-Western ideology. Enough pro-Western forces exist in Iran for a reconciliation with the U.S. to be possible sometime in the future. But decades after Iran's Islamic Revolution, anger predominates on both sides and makes such a possibility improbable." -NYTimes Scholastic |