"We did not treat the Americans badly. They left Iran in a relaxed mood. The embassy was active here after the revolution. We didn't have any problem with them. They started it"
About this Quote
The sentence is built like a tidy alibi: calm, procedural, almost bored with drama. Rafsanjani opens by laundering emotion out of a moment defined by it. "Relaxed mood" is an absurdly domestic phrase for a revolutionary rupture, and that’s the point. If you can make departure sound like the end of a pleasant visit, you pre-empt the accusation that Iran drove the Americans out through intimidation or chaos.
Then comes the strategic pivot: the embassy. Saying it "was active here after the revolution" is a quiet claim to legitimacy. Revolutions, in this telling, can be normal governments, capable of hosting foreign missions and enforcing rules. The subtext is aimed at international audiences who treat the Islamic Republic as inherently rogue: we behaved like a state; you treated us like a problem.
The most telling line is the flat, schoolyard cadence of "We didn't have any problem with them. They started it". It shrinks a long history of U.S.-Iran entanglement - from the 1953 coup to the Shah’s security apparatus to post-revolution paranoia about counterrevolution - into a single question of who threw the first punch. That simplification isn’t ignorance; it’s a deliberate moral reframing. If America "started it", Iran’s later actions become reaction, not aggression.
Rafsanjani’s intent is exculpation with a veneer of reasonableness: we were open, you provoked, we responded. It’s not a confession or a threat. It’s a bid to control the narrative of responsibility, the currency that decides who gets sanctioned, isolated, or forgiven.
Then comes the strategic pivot: the embassy. Saying it "was active here after the revolution" is a quiet claim to legitimacy. Revolutions, in this telling, can be normal governments, capable of hosting foreign missions and enforcing rules. The subtext is aimed at international audiences who treat the Islamic Republic as inherently rogue: we behaved like a state; you treated us like a problem.
The most telling line is the flat, schoolyard cadence of "We didn't have any problem with them. They started it". It shrinks a long history of U.S.-Iran entanglement - from the 1953 coup to the Shah’s security apparatus to post-revolution paranoia about counterrevolution - into a single question of who threw the first punch. That simplification isn’t ignorance; it’s a deliberate moral reframing. If America "started it", Iran’s later actions become reaction, not aggression.
Rafsanjani’s intent is exculpation with a veneer of reasonableness: we were open, you provoked, we responded. It’s not a confession or a threat. It’s a bid to control the narrative of responsibility, the currency that decides who gets sanctioned, isolated, or forgiven.
Quote Details
| Topic | War |
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