Since the 1979 storming of the embassy and seizure of American diplomats in Tehran, the United States has imposed wave after wave of sanctions on the Islamic Republic of Iran. Over time, the sanctions have grown from Executive orders aimed at Iranian support for terrorism into a far more comprehensive congressional and international regime that focuses on Iran’s nuclear program. As negotiations over this program continue, legal analysis of non-proliferation agreements, sanctions law and the respective foreign policy powers of Congress and the President have become inextricably linked to the diplomatic initiative with the Islamic Republic.
Latest in Iran
Iran's latest protests echo previous waves of unrest, but are more widespread and more violent that before.
The 40-year legacy of the 444-day crisis.
A new Lawfare Institute e-book, "The United States and the Use of Force Against Iran,” is now available on Kindle.
It turns out that U.S. Cyber Command’s June 2019 Iran operation may have been narrower—and more effective—than previously understood.
Recent tensions between the United States and Iran have led many members of Congress to speculate about what legal authority the Trump administration may claim it has to go to war without congressional authorization. On June 28, the State Department gave a partial answer to these questions, at least insofar as they relate to the 2001 and 2002 Authorizations for Use of Military Force (AUMFs).
The president announced on June 21 that he had called off a potential U.S. military strike on Iran in response to Iran’s shootdown of a U.S. Navy remotely piloted vehicle (RPV). The strike, according to the president, could have incurred casualties of as high as 150 people—information that has sparked discussion over the proportionality of such a response under international law. Before jumping to this debate, however, there is another issue that needs to be considered first: the question of necessity.
Following news that Iran shot down a U.S. Navy Global Hawk—an unmanned surveillance aircraft—the Trump administration came close to ordering a responsive set of airstrikes but ultimately elected not to do so. Then we learned (first from Yahoo!
For the past two months, the Middle East has teetered on the edge of war. Tensions over the U.S. “maximum pressure” campaign have led Iran to target maritime shipping in the Persian Gulf, launch rockets on U.S.
The president’s statements on Iran represent a dramatic improvement in the quality of his argument.
On June 20, U.S. military officials confirmed media reports that Iranian military forces successfully shot down a U.S. drone in the vicinity of the Persian Gulf.