The US and Iran have had bitter relations for many years

[ad_1] WASHINGTON (AP) — Now comes a brand new chapter in U.S.-Iran relations , whether or not for the higher or the even worse.

For almost a half century, the world has witnessed an enmity for the ages — the threats, the plotting, the toxic rhetoric between the “Nice Devil” of Iranian lore and the “Axis of Evil” troublemaker of the Center East, in America’s eyes.

Now we now have a U.S. president saying, of all issues, “God bless Iran.”

This transformation of tone, nonetheless fleeting, got here after the extreme U.S. bombing of Iranian nuclear-development sites this week, Iran’s retaliatory but restrained assault on a U.S. military base in Qatar and the tentative ceasefire brokered by President Donald Trump within the Israel-Iran struggle.

A B-2 bomber arrives at Whiteman Air Pressure Base Mo., Sunday, June 22, 2025. (AP Picture/David Smith)

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The U.S. assault on three targets inflicted serious damage however didn't destroy them, a U.S. intelligence report discovered, contradicting Trump’s assertion that the assault “obliterated” Iran’s nuclear program.

Listed here are some questions and solutions concerning the lengthy historical past of dangerous blood between the 2 international locations:

Why did Trump supply blessings throughout? Within the first blush of a ceasefire settlement, even earlier than Israel and Iran gave the impression to be absolutely on board, Trump exulted within the achievement. “God bless Israel,” he posted on social media. “God bless Iran.” He wished blessings on the Center East, America and the world, too.

When it turned clear that every one hostilities had not instantly ceased in spite of everything, he took to swearing as a substitute.

“We principally have two international locations which have been preventing so lengthy and so onerous that they don’t know what the f— they’re doing,” he mentioned on digicam.

In that second, Trump was particularly important of Israel, the steadfast U.S. ally, for seeming much less connected to the pause in preventing than the nation that has been shouting “Demise to America” for generations and is accused of attempting to assassinate him.

Why did U.S.-Iran relations bitter within the first place? In two phrases, Operation Ajax.

That was the 1953 coup orchestrated by the CIA, with British assist, that overthrew Iran’s democratically elected authorities and handed energy to the shah, Mohammad Reza Pahlavi. The Western powers had feared the rise of Soviet affect and the nationalization of Iran’s oil business.

The shah was a strategic U.S. ally who repaired official relations with Washington. However grievances simmered amongst Iranians over his autocratic rule and his bowing to America’s pursuits.

All of that boiled over in 1979 when the shah fled the nation and the theocratic revolutionaries took management, imposing their very own onerous line.

Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini has a heavy escort as he enters automobile to go away the airport in Tehran, Iran, Feb. 1, 1979, after arriving again within the nation on a chartered Air France Boing 747. (AP Picture/FY, File)

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How did the Iranian revolution deepen tensions? Profoundly.

On Nov. 4, 1979, with anti-American sentiment at a fever pitch, Iranian college students took 66 American diplomats and residents hostage and held greater than 50 of them in captivity for 444 days .

The doorway to the U.S. Embassy in Tehran, Iran, the place 63 persons are being held hostage, seen in 1980. Graffiti on the wall at left reads: “Expensive American minority, brothers and sisters (Blacks and Indians) examine the holy Koran and begin a revolution towards U.S. discrimination. God and Iranian Muslim persons are supporting you. Down with Reagan.” (AP Picture, File)

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It was a humiliating spectacle for the USA and President Jimmy Carter, who ordered a secret rescue mission months into the Iran hostage disaster. In Operation Eagle Claw, eight Navy helicopters and 6 Air Pressure transport planes had been despatched to rendezvous within the Iranian desert. A sand storm aborted the mission and eight service members died when a helicopter crashed right into a C-120 refueling aircraft.

Diplomatic ties had been severed in 1980 and stay damaged.

Stays of a burned-out U.S. helicopter lis photographed within the japanese desert area of Iran, April 27,1980, someday after an abortive American commando raid to free the U.S. Embassy hostages. (AP Picture, File)

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Iran launched the hostages minutes after Ronald Reagan’s presidential inauguration on Jan. 20, 1981. That was simply lengthy sufficient to make sure that Carter, bogged within the disaster for over a 12 months, wouldn't see them freed in his time period.

President Jimmy Carter prepares to make a nationwide tv handle from the Oval Workplace on the White Home, April 25, 1980, in Washington, on the failed mission to rescue the Iran hostages. (AP Picture, File)

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Was this week’s U.S. assault the primary towards Iran? No. However the final massive one was at sea.

On April 18, 1988, the U.S. Navy sank two Iranian ships, broken one other and destroyed two surveillance platforms in its largest floor engagement since World Struggle II. Operation Praying Mantis was in retaliation towards the mining of the united statesSamuel B. Roberts within the Persian Gulf 4 days earlier. Ten sailors had been injured and the explosion left a gaping gap within the hull.

Did the U.S. take sides within the Iran-Iraq struggle? Not formally, however primarily.

The U.S. offered financial support, intelligence sharing and military-adjacent expertise to Iraq, involved that an Iranian victory would unfold instability by the area and pressure oil provides. Iran and Iraq emerged from the 1980-1988 struggle with no clear victor and the lack of a whole lot of 1000's of lives, whereas U.S.-Iraq relations fractured spectacularly within the years after.

What was the Iran-Contra affair? An instance of U.S.-Iran cooperation of kinds — an unlawful, and secret, one till it wasn’t.

Not lengthy after the U.S. designated Iran a state sponsor of terrorism in 1984 — a standing that is still — it emerged that America was illicitly promoting arms to Iran. One function was to win the discharge of hostages in Lebanon underneath the management of Iran-backed Hezbollah. The opposite was to lift secret cash for the Contra rebels in Nicaragua in defiance of a U.S. ban on supporting them.

President Ronald Reagan fumbled his approach by the scandal however emerged unscathed — legally if not reputationally.

What number of nations does the U.S. designate as state sponsors of terrorism? Solely 4: Iran, North Korea, Cuba and Syria.

The designation makes these international locations the goal of broad sanctions. Syria’s designation is being reviewed in gentle of the autumn of Bashar Assad’s government .

The place did the time period ‘Axis of Evil’ come from? From President George W. Bush in his 2002 State of the Union handle. He spoke 5 months after the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist assaults and the 12 months earlier than he launched the invasion of Iraq on the fallacious premise that Saddam Hussein possessed weapons of mass destruction.

He singled out Iran, North Korea and Saddam’s Iraq and mentioned: “States like these, and their terrorist allies, represent an axis of evil, arming to threaten the peace of the world.”

In response, Iran and a few of its anti-American proxies and allies within the area took to calling their casual coalition an Axis of Resistance at occasions.

What about these proxies and allies? Some, like Hezbollah and Hamas, are degraded because of Israel’s fierce and sustained assault on them. In Syria, Assad fled to security in Moscow after dropping energy to rebels as soon as tied to al-Qaida however now cautiously welcomed by Trump.

In Yemen, Houthi rebels who've attacked business ships within the Crimson Sea and pledged widespread trigger with Palestinians have been bombed by the U.S. and Britain. In Iraq, armed Shia factions managed or supported by Iran nonetheless function and appeal to periodic assaults from the USA.

What about Iran’s nuclear program?

FILE - An Iranian demonstrator holds an anti-U.S. signal throughout an annual rally in entrance of the previous U.S. Embassy in Tehran, marking thirty sixth anniversary of the seizure of the embassy by militant Iranian college students, Iran, Oct. 4, 2015. (AP Picture/Vahid Salemi, File)

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In 2015, President Barack Obama and different powers struck a cope with Iran to restrict its nuclear growth in return for the easing of sanctions. Iran agreed to eliminate an enriched uranium stockpile, dismantle most centrifuges and provides worldwide inspectors extra entry to see what it was doing.

FILE - This imagereleased by an official web site of the workplace of the Iranian Presidency, exhibits President Hassan Rouhani listens to explanations on new nuclear achievements at a ceremony to mark “Nationwide Nuclear Day,” in Tehran, Iran, April 9, 2018. (Iranian Presidency Workplace by way of AP)

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Trump assailed the deal in his 2016 marketing campaign and scrapped it two years later as president, imposing a “most strain” marketing campaign of sanctions. He argued the deal solely delayed the event of nuclear weapons and did nothing to restrain Iran’s aggression within the area. Iran’s nuclear program resumed over time and, in accordance with inspectors, accelerated in latest months.

Trump’s exit from the nuclear deal brought a warning from Hassan Rouhani, then Iran’s president, in 2018: “America should perceive effectively that peace with Iran is the mom of all peace. And struggle with Iran is the mom of all wars.”

How did Trump reply to Iran’s provocations?

Coffins of Gen. Qassem Soleimani and others who had been killed in Iraq by a U.S. drone strike, are carried on a truck surrounded by mourners throughout a funeral procession, within the metropolis of Kerman, Iran, Jan. 7, 2020. (AP Picture, File)

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In January 2020, Trump ordered the drone strike that killed Qassem Soleimani, Iran’s prime commander, when he was in Iraq.

Then Iran got here after him, in accordance with President Joe Biden’s legal professional basic, Merrick Garland. Days after Trump received final 12 months’s election, the Justice Division filed fees towards an Iranian man believed to nonetheless be in his nation and two alleged associates in New York.

“The Justice Division has charged an asset of the Iranian regime who was tasked by the regime to direct a community of legal associates to additional Iran’s assassination plots towards its targets, together with President-elect Donald Trump,” Garland mentioned.

Now, Trump is searching for peace on the desk after ordering bombs dropped on Iran, and providing blessings.

It's doubtlessly the mom of all turnarounds.

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This story has been up to date to right that the Syrian rebels who got here to energy after Bashar Assad fled to Moscow had been tied to al-Qaida, not the Islamic State.

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