What We Get Wrong About Iran, with Vali Nasr

About this episode

Vali Nasr discusses Iran's strategic actions and the misconceptions surrounding its government in the context of U.S. foreign policy.

In this episode of International Horizons, RBI director John Torpey talks with Vali Nasr, Majid Khadduri Professor of International Affairs and Middle East Studies and former dean at Johns Hopkins University’s School of Advanced International Studies, about Iran’s dangerous crossroads after its latest clash with Israel and the United States. Nasr argues that Western narratives about Iran as a reckless theocracy miss the calculated grand strategy behind its actions — a strategy rooted in centuries of imperial ambition, deep-seated insecurity, and anti-American resentment. He explains why the Islamic Republic has survived despite public disillusionment and why hopes of regime change are naïve. Nasr warns that Iran’s nuclear ambitions are now more entrenched than ever, as ordinary Iranians begin to see the bomb as their only shield against annihilation. With the U.S. unwilling to invade but also disinclined to negotiate in good faith, Nasr lays out the stark choice Washington faces: a nuclear Iran or another disastrous Middle East war. Nasr recently published Iran’s Grand Strategy: A Political History (Princeton University Press), and is also the author of The Dispensable Nation…

People in this episode

Host: John Torpey

Guest: Vali Nasr

Topics covered

• Iran
• U.S. foreign policy
• Middle East
• nuclear strategy
• regime change
• Western narratives

Keywords

• Iran
• Vali Nasr
• nuclear ambitions
• U.S. foreign policy
• Middle East conflict
• regime change
• Western narratives

Mentioned in this episode

Organizations: Johns Hopkins University, Princeton University Press, Penguin, W.W. Norton

Places: Iran, United States, Israel

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