The Human Cost of Sanctions on Iran

The latest sanctions on Iran will likely drive millions into poverty and destitution, weakening the opposition and increasing the power of the Iranian government, to the detriment of U.S. interests.

by Hani Mansourian

In a 1996 interview with 60 Minutes, Madeline Albright, then Secretary of State under Bill Clinton, was asked about the impact of U.S. sanctions on Iraq. Implemented in response to Iraq’s invasion of Kuwait in 1990, the sanctions had crippled Iraq’s economy and devastated its civilian population. Unofficial figures from the United Nations, as well as other organizations, estimated that at least half a million children had died as a result of these sanctions.¹ This led 60 minute correspondent, Leslie Stahl, to ask Albright whether the intended outcomes were worth the human cost. Albright responded, “I think this is a very hard choice. But the price … we think the price is worth it.”

Hans von Sponeck, the U.N. Humanitarian Coordinator in Iraq from November 1998 to February 2000, disagreed profoundly. Following 30 years of service, von Sponeck resigned from the U.N., citing as his reason “the continuation of a sanction[s] regime in Iraq despite overwhelming evidence that the fabric of Iraqi society is swiftly eroding and an international awareness that the approach chosen so clearly punishes the wrong party.”² Worse still, the price paid by the Iraqi people never brought about the changes for which Secretary Albright and others had hoped. Instead, it took the 2003 U.S. invasion of the country to bring about the long-desired outcome of toppling Saddam Hussein’s government.