Tensions with Iran

Tensions with Iran have been an issue for the United States as well as other nations of the international community since the overthrow of the United States-backed Mohammad Reza Shah during the Iranian Revolution of 1978.

In 1953, responding to fears that Iran would become a communist nation, the United States and United Kingdom arrange to replace Prime Minister Muhammad Mussadeq with the more Western-friendly Mohammad Reza Shah. Where Iran had previously been a parliamentary democracy, it rapidly became a dictatorship. In 1978, Iranians revolted. By 1979, they had made the Ayatollah Khomeini their new leader. When the United States agreed to let the cancer-sickened Shah into the country, Iranian students took US diplomats hostage for 444 days, bringing US-Iran relations at a new nadir. More recently, the United States has accused Iran of pursuing weapons of mass destruction, including nuclear weapons.

1. Capital: Tehran
2. Government: Islamic Republic, declared in 1979
3. Population: 71,208,000 (2007)
4. Area: 636,372 square miles
5. Currency: Iranian Rial (IRR)
6. Official Language: Persian

• Mahmoud Ahmadinejad
  • CNN: Ahmadinejad cancels U.N. Security Council Visit
• War on Terror
  • CSMonitor: Study calls Iran 'biggest beneficiary' of U.S. War on Terror (2006)
• Shiite Muslims
  • WashingtonPost.com: Iran Said to Support Shiite Militias in Iraq (2006)