Summary: The Mirror of History
• The Power of Role Reversal: To understand the current friction between the U.S. and Iran, we must imagine a 1953 where Iran overthrew a democratically elected American president and installed a violent, decades-long puppet regime.
• The Embassy Context: The 1979 hostage crisis is reframed not as an unprovoked act, but as a reactionary strike against a perceived hub of foreign interference and espionage.
• A Cycle of Escalation: Using “Canada” as a proxy for Iraq, the analogy illustrates how Iranian intervention in North American wars and the placement of bases in our “backyard” would make American resistance look like common sense to us, yet look like “terrorism” to them.
• The Cost of Blindness: A persistent lack of self-awareness regarding the 1953 coup has created a “red blanket” effect, where every American attempt to “dig in deeper” for security only serves to further destabilize the relationship.
• The Bottom Line: National security depends on recognizing that our past actions set off a chain of events that makes our current “moral outrage” look hypocritical and disconnected from reality to the other side.
Our national security may depend on deconstructing and properly understanding the claim that Iran has been in a murderous, 47-year-long war with the United States. To truly grasp the situation, we need a role reversal.
Imagine it’s 1953, and Iran has just conducted a covert coup against our democratically elected president. They follow that up by setting up an agency that is extremely violent and suppresses any dissent against their hand-picked leader. They try to force their cultural values onto a major segment of our population that isn’t ready for them.
This cultural takeover and suppression lasts for over two decades. Meanwhile, Iran maintains an embassy that is highly likely to be running operations against us.
Twenty-six years pass. It’s 1979, and finally, an opposition arises that is able to overthrow the Iranians who forced their way into control. We want to rid ourselves of their influence, so we sack their embassy because we believe they are still running things from there.
We start calling them the “Great Satan” and chanting “Death to Iran!” How does Iran respond in this role reversal? They start saying things like, “Oh my goodness, the USA wants us dead! They’ve just declared war on us! How could they do such a thing?”
Given the history, such a response from Iran sounds ridiculous, right? Well, that’s how we sound to them.
But it gets better. Stick with me.
In 1980, Canada decides to go to war with us, and who decides to help arm them? Iran, of course. Then 1983 comes along, and Iran sends their Marines to our region. Based on what they’ve done in the past and what they’re doing now, we do not want them in our neighborhood. So, we train a group to bomb them and push them out. We succeed.
How does Iran react? “Oh my goodness, they call us the Great Satan and just killed our Marines! Why would they do such a thing?” At this point, we’d be looking at Iran and asking, “Are you serious?” Iran’s reaction looks ridiculous, right? Well, that’s how we look to them.
Let’s keep going. Iran also imposes crippling economic sanctions for decades, then decides to invade Canada and build multiple military bases in our backyard. Naturally, we try to push them out. This localized struggle goes on for nearly three decades.
Then 2026 comes along, and Iran says, “Okay, we’ve had enough. The USA has been calling us the Great Satan and murdering us for 47 years. We have to end this finally.” In our role reversal, given the history, Iran sounds insane. That’s how we sound to them now.
So, what’s my point?
Our actions in 1953, which we thought would make things better, actually set off a decades-long chain of events that made things worse. A total failure of self-awareness and a tendency to “dig in deeper” has made us less secure, not more. And here we are in 2026, thinking that digging in even further will surely work this time, all while remaining oblivious to why they react the way they do.
I’m not suggesting the naive idea that if we leave people alone, they’ll leave us alone. But it’s equally naive to think we can do what we did to Iran and not expect it to be like waving a red blanket in front of an angry bull.