As President Donald Trump’s rhetoric against Iran heats up again, it is worth recalling a time when the two countries had a distinctly different relationship.
That time began in the 1800s, as American missionaries journeyed to what was then called Persia.
The missionaries helped build important institutions – schools, colleges, hospitals and medical schools – in Persia, many of which still exist.
So when Dr. Joseph Plumb Cochran, an American physician fluent in Persian, Turkish, Kurdish and Assyrian, died at Urmia in northwestern Iran in 1905, over 10,000 people attended his funeral.
Cochran founded a hospital in Urmia in 1879, as well as Iran’s first medical school.
This image clashes with most American stereotypes of Iran and its people, and is at odds with decades of anti-Iranian sentiment emanating from Washington.
Iran and the United States, in fact, have a deep history of mutual respect and friendship.
From 1834, when the first Protestant American mission was established in Urmia, until 1953, when the CIA’s involvement in Iran’s internal affairs set the United States on the road to conflict with Tehran, Americans were the good guys.
Imperial bad guys
My interest in the history of Iranian-American relations stems from 45 years as an archaeologist specializing in Iran, and from research on Iranian history in the context of changes undergone by Iran’s nomadic population through time.
For years, Americans have seen images of Iranians shouting “Death to America.” Now it’s the country’s lawmakers doing it. President Trump returns the sentiment, recently threatening Iran with death and destruction.
But before all that happened, when Americans were the good guys, there were other countries who were instead reviled by Iran.
The bad guys, at whose hands Iran suffered most, were Russia and Great Britain. Those two nations – often at the invitation of Iran’s leaders – economically exploited Persia to further their own imperial ambitions, using sustained diplomatic, military and economic pressure.
After two ill-judged wars fought against Russia – the First (1804-1813) and Second Russo-Persian Wars (1826-1828) – Persia (the name Iran was officially adopted in 1935) lost large amounts of territory to the Czar.
Much later, Russia found another means of exerting control over the Persian crown, loaning millions of rubles to its rulers, like Mozaffar ed-Din Shah, who reigned from 1896-1902 and needed capital to fund his lavish lifestyle.
With the exception of the Anglo-Persian War (1856-1857), Persian relations with Great Britain were less openly hostile. But what they lacked in martial vigor was more than compensated for by economic exploitation.