Hamid Khoshayand \u2013 Expert on regional affairs<\/p>\n
The US Secretary of the Treasury has unveiled a new sanctions package under the title “Economic Exclusion Operation,” calling it “the largest organized financial assault against an enemy in history.” This action, framed with rhetoric such as “economic suffocation” and “economic D-Day,” is announced six months after the end of the US military conflict against \u00a0Iran, following Washington’s failure to advance its military objectives in Iran.<\/p>\n
The question arises: can America’s new campaign, which is in fact a reproduction of the same “maximum pressure” policy with new media hype, succeed? Field realities and international positions indicate that this operation not only offers no new initiative but also faces major structural, political, and legal obstacles that make its failure likely.<\/p>\n
Reproduction of failed policies<\/p>\n
The United States has announced that the new sanctions target five vital sectors \u2013 digital assets, technology, gold, aviation, and shipping \u2013 and that any entity or country engaging in economic interaction with Iran will be subject to secondary penalties and expulsion from the dollar-based system. However, many, even in the United States, believe that these measures are nothing but the same old tools.<\/p>\n
Robert Kagan, a US foreign policy expert, stated in an interview with CNN: “Many of the actions the Secretary of the Treasury spoke about today are the same types of sanctions that have been around for years.” In other words, the US sanctions regime has reached a saturation point, leaving little room for new sanctions. The repetition of names of individuals and companies in statements also indicates Washington’s inability to find new areas for pressure.<\/p>\n
Paul Krugman, economist and Nobel Prize laureate in economics, also believes: “The economic campaign will fail just as the military campaign failed.”<\/p>\n
Robert Malley, former member of the US nuclear negotiating team, said: “Can more pressure make Iran surrender and retreat from positions that they consider vital and non-negotiable? Certainly not.”<\/p>\n
Chris Murphy, a US Senator, also described the “economic D-Day” rhetoric as “desperate window-dressing” to conceal Washington’s military failures and emphasized: “Iran now controls the Strait of Hormuz, and after the US fired ‘everything,’ it still holds all the leverage.”<\/p>\n
Peter Schiff, a prominent American investor and financial analyst, also stated: “The economic exclusion operation will not only fail, but the economic noose that is really being tightened may ultimately be the same noose wrapped around our own necks.”<\/p>\n
Explicit opposition from China, Russia, and other countries<\/p>\n
The opposition of major powers and some of Iran’s trading partners is a significant obstacle to the success of the new US economic campaign against Iran. China has explicitly stated that it will not cooperate with unilateral sanctions. China’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs also called this action “lacking a basis in international law and Security Council authorization” and emphasized that it will continue its economic interactions with Iran. Beijing even issued a resolution in May 2026 prohibiting Chinese companies from complying with US sanctions against Iran.<\/p>\n
Russia, which itself is subject to extensive Western sanctions, not only does not cooperate with this operation but has expanded its economic and military cooperation with Tehran. Alexei Pushkov, a Russian senator, described this US action as “a confrontation between independent countries and Washington’s hegemony.”<\/p>\n
Countries such as Qatar, Oman, and even some European Union members have also expressed concern over unilateral US sanctions, emphasizing that such actions jeopardize global economic stability.<\/p>\n
Furthermore, Iran has 15 direct neighbors, a capacity that provides the country with diverse economic and logistical routes capable of rendering even the harshest sanctions a low impact tool.<\/p>\n
Psychological operation for domestic exploitation<\/p>\n
The timing of this package’s announcement, coinciding with the approach of the midterm congressional elections and efforts to control energy prices in global markets, indicates that this action is less a strategic initiative and more a tactic to disrupt Iran’s economic environment and a psychological-media operation to cover up the US administration’s failures. The fact that Trump immediately after unveiling his new economic campaign wrote on Truth Social that “Iran is completely collapsing” reveals the behind-the-scenes dimensions of this campaign, which are inconsistent with field realities.<\/p>\n
Therefore, the new US sanctions not only lack legal backing but could also serve as a basis for legal action against Washington in international legal forums. Iranian officials have also repeatedly emphasized that these sanctions target the livelihoods and health of ordinary people.<\/p>\n
The so-called American “economic exclusion” operation is more a media measure for managing domestic public opinion, relatively controlling the energy market, and reducing Trump’s electoral concerns on the eve of the midterm congressional elections than an effective strategic initiative. This campaign faces three fundamental obstacles: the saturation of US sanctions tools, opposition from China, Russia, and other Iranian partners, and Washington’s inability or unwillingness to enter into direct economic confrontation with Beijing.<\/p>\n
The new sanctions not only lack the capacity to change Iran’s political behavior but could also lead to the strengthening of the resistance economy, the expansion of regional and non-Western cooperation, and the acceleration of the multipolarization of the global financial system. Moreover, unilateral US sanctions face legitimacy challenges from the perspective of international law and could provide grounds for legal pursuit against Washington, especially as their effects directly target the livelihoods and health of ordinary people.<\/p>\n
Historical experience shows that excessive and unconventional use of sanctions tools ultimately exhausts the sanctioning power, because indiscriminate economic pressure, instead of subduing the target country, strengthens alternative routes and new coalitions. This truth stands before the eyes of the world; a country that endures against a full-scale war that could have destroyed even great powers in less than a week, and overcomes the enemy, will never yield or fail in the face of sanctions.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
SCFR Online – Opinion: The new US sanctions against Iran, despite extensive propaganda, face serious obstacles to success due to the ineffectiveness of sanctions tools and opposition from some of Tehran’s trading partners.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":422077,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[13268,17,12726],"tags":[48540,48539,25297,21843,18489,48541,25359,37101,15786,13611],"class_list":["post-422100","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-note","category-politics","category-10-en-2","tag-china-russia-cooperation","tag-failure-of-sanctions-against-iran","tag-hamid-khoshayand","tag-international-law-en-4","tag-maximum-pressure","tag-multipolar-financial-system","tag-resistive-economy","tag-secondary-sanctions-en","tag-strategic-council-on-foreign-relations-en","tag-us-economic-terrorism"],"yoast_head":"\n