What's your alternative to sanctions that's more effective? War?
So while I share the skepticism expressed upthread that blocking websites is effective diplomacy, it's hard for me to look at the situation and see a one-sided problem.
Secondly, this is not a question of they block our services, so we block their services. In both cases, it is Iranians who lose access to services.
If anything, it highlights the hypocrisy of pretending to care about Iranian freedom.
NATO is not going to trade and help technologically a country that's trying to develop nuclear weapons in order to threaten to NATO and their main officially stated enemy – United States.
Why would you buy oil from a country or give access to your tech to them when they are using these resources to ramp up their military against you?
Does the US sanction China like it does Iran? The only difference is that China is a larger market than Iran and is close to power parity with the US.
These sanctions are ineffective and disproportionately punish your average Iranian citizen, while we ignore the elephant that is China, which is far more dangerous as an adversary [1] [2].
[1] https://www.amazon.com/Hundred-Year-Marathon-Strategy-Replac...
[2] https://www.brookings.edu/blog/order-from-chaos/2020/09/04/w...
However, I'm also in favor of blanket sanctions against any nation whose parliament takes up a literal "Marg bar Āmrikā" collective chant.
And you're against sanctions because they don't kill enough people.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iran%E2%80%93United_States_rel...
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iran%E2%80%93United_States_rel...
And at the same time the US still imposes embargo on Cuba, 60 years after the nationalization of the property of American companies [0]. How much time has to pass before it's no longer appropriate?
"In October 1960 a key incident occurred: Eisenhower's government refused to export oil to the island, leaving Cuba reliant on Soviet crude oil, which the American companies in Cuba refused to refine. This led the Cuban government to nationalize all three American-owned oil refineries in Cuba in response. The refinery owners were not compensated for the nationalization of their property. The refineries became part of the state-run company, Unión Cuba-Petróleo.[19][20] This prompted the Eisenhower administration to launch the first trade embargo—a prohibition against selling all products to Cuba except food and medicine. The Cuban regime responded with nationalization of all American businesses and most American privately-owned properties on the island. No compensation was given for the seizures, and a number of diplomats were expelled from Cuba."
[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_embargo_against_...
This is a great phrase, I'm going to borrow that and use it.
I'm curious if:
1) you still live in Iran and/or have immediate family who do?
2) is your opinion common amongst Iranians (and/or Persians)?
3) do/would you still feel the same way if the sanctions brought extreme economic hardship on the people of Iran?
(Considering your remark about North Korea, I'm assuming the answer to the latter is "yes".)
2) I don’t know. I know there is a minority (again no idea how big) that really likes Trump because they really hate the Islamic regime, but these people tend to be poor (? Again not that sure) and have little grasp of economics or international politics.
3) The current sanctions have brought extreme hardships on us Iranians. From my own selfish viewpoint, I am hoping for much lighter sanctions from the potential Biden presidency. I would, however, prefer the harsh sanctions to the IR ever having nuclear bombs. (Not that I can see them being effective at preventing the bombs.) I am also not poor; I think a high-pressure strategy that results in a mass revolution by the poor can be to their medium term advantage (such a revolution would, of course, hurt the middle/upper classes a lot). But such a revolution might very well be impossible by the modern technology and the centralization of power. So to summarize, I think effective sanctions will be worth the hardships they cause, but ineffective sanctions not. The current hard sanctions seem ineffective to me unless they are made much more stringent (which might not be possible) or are paired with military interventions.
What the US really wants is not respect of human rights or better living conditions for the people (see Libya, see Iraq, see Palestine, see the bloody civil war in Syria). What they want is to reduce every non-aligned country to either vassal or rubble.
On your second point, I want to be clear that I'm not defending the Iranian gov't. I disagree with the use of sanctions that disproportionately effect the least powerful in there society, by design. This is compounded by the fact that the reasons for these sanctions are not moral violations, as the US and its allies behave in much the same way, but instead about international power.
Geopolitics is messy. In the end I don't see any other strategy besides war that could force Irans hand. If the choices are 1. Show the world that purposefully funding terrorism goes unpunished 2. war, or 3. sanctions I think sanctions are the choice that provides the greatest amount of utility, even if they do harm many.
I find that very hard to believe, considering the activities of the CIA -- just the ones we know about -- over the last several decades (or, really, since its beginning).
--
Side note:
Does selling billions of dollars worth of arms to Saudi Arabia count as sponsoring terrorists?
cf. Jamal Khashoggi, et al.
What about civilians killed by Saudi Arabia with American-made cluster bombs?[0] Do they count?
[0] https://www.hrw.org/news/2016/05/06/yemen-saudis-using-us-cl...
Not quite the same, but anyway.
[0] https://www.wto.org/english/res_e/reser_e/ersd201803_e.pdf
The literature isn't conclusive either way, there's evidence in both directions. But sanctions definitely tend to hurt everyday citizens more than they hurt the targeted governments. Dictators and cronies aren't going to have to worry about increased prices of goods - they get whatever they want - that's sort of the point of being dictator
Respect the deal that was reached between Iran, US, and EU members.
The US unilaterally broke that, my guess is probably because the deal was reached in a pre-Trump era. Now they are deciding to further sabre rattle with sanctions.
All other parties in the deal have pretty much politely decided to ignore Trump's administration and carry on the terms of the deal.
This is more about the US administration desperately trying to look strong for their internal voters more so than actually having a plan or a coherent external policy.
Sanctions are not punishments. They are just a way to say – you're an asshole, and neither us nor our allies are going to play with you anymore.
But the sanctions against Iran are mainly based on old grudges. Pretty much nobody even knows why they exist beyond “they’re bad.”
BTW since you like whatabouism with your argument regarding Russia: Please do compare the Iranian and Saudi Arabian regimes for me; one is an enemy with sanctions and the other an ally. Internally they are not that different. Externally there is a major difference though: only one is engaging in a hostile war in another country which has resulted in civilian deaths and famine. While there are claims to be made about Iranian foreign interference it is nowhere near that level. So again please take some minutes to ponder objectively how these countries are treated.
World politics is very complex with lots of nuance, historical context and long-running grudges. It is also highly subjective, in a sense that every country / group of allied countries have their own view of the historical events and try to disseminate those views as wide as possible.
As a result, I've decided to judge countries by the authoritarianism of their regimes and cruelty of their laws. If country's government is treating their own citizens like shit without rights, I do not expect them to treat people on the outside any better, regardless of how they present themselves. Thus, I do not, as an individual human being, want to see these countries / regimes to gain any more power externally.
So far, this approach for me had made most sense.
As a side note, look at the current list of best friends of a corrupt regime in Russia: Iran, North Korea, China, Philippines, Venezuela, up until recently - Turkey. Every dictatorship in the world is on their list of friends. Same with Iran. "When the character of a man is not clear, look at their friends."
Regarding whataboutism and Russia, I want to remind you that my reply to the OP was not about Iranian sanctions, but was about sanctions as a political instrument overall. For me the most prominent case lately were sanctions against Russia, so that's what I used as an example. I'm very familiar with the situation in Russia and even though sanctions indeed antagonized the regime there, it did make them stop and think whether they want to keep escalating. It's hard to imagine what over appropriate response should've been to annexation of the Crimea, downing of the Malaysian Boeing and sending troops and equipment to create essential a civil war in a big region of Ukraine.
Enough to sell it billions worth of weapons and forgive the executions of opposition and the murder of a Washington Post journalist.
Look. I love the US (being a Mexican, I consider Mex/US relationship like a bug brother / little brother one) . But darn, it seems the pax-anericana epoch is getting weaker and weaker, and the US is just trying to cling at the last straws of influence that its left.
So tell me why are the American sanctions directed at the people of Crimea? [0]
[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/International_sanctions_during...
Regardless, I was talking about sanctions in general. Dismissing them as a valid instrument of politics is, in my opinion, misguided.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/International_sanctions_during...
If the US had chosen to respect Russian security interests, nothing would've happened. Finland understands that and lives just fine despite being outside of NATO and bordering Russia.
Antagonizing and radicalizing people? Yes, war is more effective in that.