Iran shouldn’t underestimate US stupidity: Analyst

A political commentator has warned about underestimating the “stupidity” in the US government in its negotiations.

American author and political commentator John Steppling made the comments in an interview with Press TV on Tuesday, while answering a question about remarks by Jake Sullivan, US President-elect Joe Biden's incoming national security adviser, claiming that “ballistic missiles has to be on the table as part of that follow-on negotiation" with Iran.

Iranian President Hassan Rouhani stressed last week that the issue of ballistic missile program is "non-negotiable,” noting that Biden is "well aware of it.”

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The Norway-based analyst described Sullivan as a “noted friend and sort of confidant of [former Secretary of State] Hillary Clinton.”

“Biden is stocking his administration with people that work for Obama, under Obama. They're kind of moving up a floor,” he said. “He's going to follow the script that almost all US politicians and administrations follow. We are going to see, essentially, a clone of Obama's second term.”

He further described how Tehran has been “assaulted” by the US over Washington’s anti-Iran measures, including assassinations of Iran’s Qassem Soleimani and Mohsen Fakhrizade.

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“Iran has been sort of battered and assaulted by the assassination of nuclear scientist, cyber attacks, sanctions and wholesale extra legal assassination of one of their top generals and a figure of gigantic importance to Iranian society and culture.”

Steppling also highlighted the domestic challenges Biden is facing, predicting ”an increasing backlash, and an anger” over repercussions other ehe Covid-19 pandemic.

“Right now the problem facing the Biden administration besides getting rid of Trump is what they're going to do with this massive depression domestically and there's going to be an increasing backlash, and an anger, because of the lockdowns in the US,” he said. “I mean 60 million jobs are lost and people's livelihoods have been destroyed. We've not seen the United States in this kind of economic crisis for 75 years. And that's going to take up a lot of attention in the first year for the Biden administration.”

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At the end of his remarks, the political commentator indicated that Iran-US relations could still improve, although Washington’s “banality” should be taken into consideration.

“It's hard to imagine relations will get worse under Biden than they were with Trump towards Iran, but never underestimate the banality and stupidity of the United States political leadership.”

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