Missed Opportunities: The Trump Administration, Iran, and the Coronavirus Pandemic

Abstract

On the surface, the global coronavirus pandemic of 2020 might have offered the United States and Iran an opportunity to stand down from their virtual war footing. In the lead-up to the outbreak, Iran had shot down a US drone over the Gulf in June 2019, and on January 3, President Donald J. Trump had ordered a drone strike at Baghdad International Airport on Iranian General Qasem Soleimani and his entourage. In response, Iran fired rockets at Iraqi bases where US troops were stationed, and Iraqi Shiite militias mounted attacks that killed two US military personnel and wounded several others. Some of the severe tensions derived from the Trump administration's thoroughgoing financial and trade restrictions on Iran. For its part, Washington was determined to roll back Iranian influence in Iraq, Syria and Lebanon and to protect its key allies in the region, including Israel, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates. How did these two adversaries deploy the pandemic in the service of their geopolitical goals?