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The US helps stage a coup to overthrow Iran’s democratically elected prime minister, Mossadegh. After toppling Mossadegh, the US supports Iran’s monarch Mohammad Reza Pahlavi to rule as Shah of Iran. Iranians resent the foreign interference, fueling anti-American sentiment in the country for decades to come.
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The US signs a civil nuclear cooperation agreement with Iran. The agreement provides Iran with technology and resources that eventually become the foundation for its controversial nuclear program, which it begins developing in the 1970s with support from the US.
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Millions of Iranians take to the streets in protest of the Shah’s regime, which they view as corrupt and illegitimate. The shah flees amid widespread civil unrest and eventually travels to the United States for cancer treatment. On February 1, Ayatollah Khomeini, an Islamic scholar who had been arrested and deported by the Shah in 1964, returns from exile and becomes the supreme leader of the Islamic Republic.
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A group of radical Iranian college students takes fifty-two Americans hostage at the U.S. embassy in Tehran, demanding that the United States extradite the shah. After 444 days, Iran releases the hostages in exchange for state assets being unfrozen minutes after President Ronald Reagan is sworn into office. During the crisis, the US cuts all diplomatic ties with Iran. Formal diplomatic relations have never been restored.
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Iraq invades its neighbor and growing rival Iran amid fears of a Shiite revolt against Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein. The United States supports secular Iraq with economic aid, training, and dual-use technology until the war ends in 1988.
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Senior Reagan administration officials begin secretly selling weapons to Iran to secure the release of seven Americans held hostage by Hezbollah in Lebanon. The officials use the money from the illegal deal to fund the right-wing Contras rebel groups in Nicaragua after Congress prohibits further funding of the insurgency.
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Iran quietly helps the US in its war against the Taliban, a mutual enemy of both countries. President George W. Bush describes Iran as part of an “axis of evil,” along with Iraq and North Korea. He says Iran “aggressively pursues weapons of mass destruction and exports terror, while an unelected few repress the Iranian people’s hope for freedom.” The Iranian government stops secret meetings with U.S. diplomats that are focused on capturing al-Qaeda operatives and combating the Taliban.
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Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad sends President George W. Bush an eighteen-page letter. Ahmadinejad seeks to ease U.S.-Iran nuclear tensions, but Iran takes no steps to slow its uranium enrichment program, which it says is for civilian energy production. Separately, the U.S. Congress approves the Iran Freedom Support Act in September to fund Iranian civil society and promote democracy.
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Six nations and Tehran reach a landmark agreement that slows Iran’s nuclear development program in exchange for lifting some sanctions that caused the country’s economy to stagnate.
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The United States kills Qasem Soleimani, commander of the IRGC’s elite Quds Force, with a drone strike in Baghdad. Thousands of people flood the streets of Iran to mourn him. Iran is furious and vows retaliation, ultimately firing missiles at Iraqi bases that house American troops a few days later. No lives are lost, and Trump responds by promising more sanctions.
