Confronting Iran
by Ali Ansari
Info: Ansari, Ali M. Confronting Iran: the Failure of American Foreign Policy and the Next Great Crisis in the Middle East. New York, NY: Basic Books, 2006.
Synopsis: Confronting Iran traces the interaction between Iran and America throughout the 20th century in an attempt to find the roots of the current antagonism between the two nations. Although the US and Iran have no formal diplomatic dialogue between one another, both have taken center stage in each other’s foreign policy perspectives and rhetoric. From the overthrow of Mosaddeq in 1953 to the hostage crisis in 1979 and, more recently, the Gulf War and the War in Iraq, both Iranian and American politicians have forged narratives about an “evil empire” lying half a world away and taken on the national myth of victimization.
