Media Guide: Iran in Latin America

By AIC Senior Research Fellow Andrew Lumsden

On June 12, 2023, Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi embarked on a five-day tour of three Latin American countries, the first visit of an Iranian leader to the region since 2016. In addition to praising Latin American countries for their commitment to “independence, freedom, and justice,” Raisi signed 35 agreements with his counterparts in Cuba, Nicaragua, and Venezuela, and signaled an intention to begin a new era of cooperation. 

This visit has helped to reignite discussions about the nature and extent of Iran’s relationships and activities in Latin America. Furthermore, it raises questions about ramifications for the United States, a nemesis of Tehran and a power that has for centuries been wary of foreign influences in the Americas.

This Media Guide will explore some of the key political and economic relationships Iran has built in Latin America over the past two decades, its motives, and how the United States has reacted. 

What Have Relations Between Iran and Latin America Been Like Historically?

Perhaps surprisingly, given their vast geographic separation and few commonalities, diplomatic contacts between Iran and the Latin American region have existed for well over a century.

Mexico expressed interest in establishing relations with Iran’s Qajar Empire as far back as the 1860s during the brief reign of Maximillian von Habsburg (r.1864-1867), an Austrian prince installed as Emperor of Mexico through French military intervention. Maxillian’s government appointed an ambassador, based in Istanbul, responsible for diplomacy with Iran, although the two countries would not officially exchange representatives until 1889. Qajar Iran also established diplomatic ties with Argentina in 1902, and Brazil in 1903. However, due to immense distances, communication difficulties, and bouts of political instability on both ends, formal embassies would not be opened until 1935 at the earliest. 

One of the first major instances of Iran-Latin American cooperation came in 1949, when Venezuela approached Iran and three other oil-producing states suggesting closer communication and coordination in an industry at the time dominated by European and American corporations. The Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC), among the world’s most prominent multilateral organizations, labels this the “first move” towards its creation. Iran and Venezuela would establish diplomatic relations in 1950, and be among the founding members of OPEC in 1960. Iran’s monarch Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi made his first state visits to Latin America in 1965, touring Argentina and Brazil. 

Engagement between Iran and Latin America would truly take off during the 1970s. Diplomatic relations were established with eight additional Latin American and Caribbean countries, including Peru (1973), Chile (1974), Cuba (1975), Jamaica (1975), and Barbados (1978), and economic cooperation was boosted as the Shah’s aggressive modernization and development program, known as the White Revolution, opened up demand for foreign goods, raw materials, and workers. 

For their part, Latin American leaders valued Iran as an important source of oil, investment capital, and technical knowledge. Furthermore, Iran’s status as a close ally of the United States made cooperation politically valuable. Between 1974 and 1978, Argentina, Peru, Brazil, Costa Rica, Chile, Mexico, Venezuela, Uruguay, and Nicaragua all sent delegations to Tehran seeking investments and other forms of economic and cultural cooperation. Some notable deals included Iran’s US$100 million loan to Peru for the construction of the Northern Peruvian Oil Pipeline in 1975 and the creation of a joint Brazilian-Iranian ministerial commission for economic cooperation which sought to increase the value, scope and volume of bilateral trade. 

The Iranian Revolution 

The Iranian Revolution of 1979 upended Tehran’s Latin American relationships and largely unraveled the plans for cooperation laid throughout the preceding decade. Iran’s monarchy was abolished and replaced with an Islamic Republic led by Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini. 

Forced to leave Iran, and met with the reluctance of his Western allies to host him, the former Shah would spend much of his exile in Latin America. He settled in Mexico from June to November 1979 and then in Panama until March 1980, before leaving for Egypt where he later died. 

In addition to transforming Iran from one of the United States’s closest allies to one of its bitterest opponents, the revolution also led to the rupture of Iran’s relations with some key Latin American powers, including Mexico, which closed its Tehran embassy in 1979, and Chile with which Iran cut ties in 1980 in protest of the country’s pro-American military government. 

Ahmadinejad and the Pink Tide

Politically and economically isolated because of its deteriorating relations with the West, Iran’s willingness and ability to engage with Latin America greatly diminished. However, the early 2000s would see a resurgence of interest in cooperation on both ends. 

Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, a hardline conservative populist was elected Iran’s president in 2005. Beginning in 2006, Iran came under increasing U.S. and international sanctions after it refused to comply with UN demands for transparency about and suspension of its uranium enrichment program. While Tehran insists that it is pursuing nuclear technology for strictly energy purposes, the enrichment process theoretically could lead to the creation of a nuclear weapon. 

Facing greater global isolation, under Ahmadinejad Tehran embarked on a deliberate campaign to build relationships with sympathetic governments. This broadly coincided with the so-called ‘pink tide’ emergence of left-wing leaders, many with anti-American sentiments, across much of Latin America. Ahmadinejad boasted in 2009 that “when the Western countries were trying to isolate Iran, we went to the U.S. backyard.” 

Between 2005 and 2009, Iran more than doubled its diplomatic presence in Latin America, opening embassies in six new countries, including Colombia, Bolivia and Uruguay. It also sought to expand its dealings in the region beyond simple trade and diplomacy, to include scientific and geopolitical cooperation.

Today, relations between Iran and the West are again on the decline, and Tehran’s current conservative president has expressed his intention to once again build a presence in America’s “backyard.”

What are Iran’s Present Goals in Latin America?

In an interview with Venezuelan media during his 2023 visit, President Raisi laid out his vision and motivations for Iranian engagement with Latin America. Similar to Ahmadinejad, he sees Latin America as a front in the global “war of wills,” between “nations that want to live independently” and the United States, which he says wants all nations “under its supervision and control.” 

He argues also that Iranian “cooperation” with Latin American countries, along with others in the Global South “can be very effective” in reshaping the global geopolitical order in favor of “independent nations.” Moreover, he calls U.S. economic sanctions akin to a “military attack” on nations, arguing that through “strengthening” relations, “good communication and pooling of capacities,” sanctioned countries can “neutralize the embargoes.” 

In summary, Iran sees engaging and cooperating with Latin American countries as a path to circumventing U.S. economic sanctions and undermining the U.S.-led global geopolitical order. 

How Is Iran Engaging With Latin America?

Unsurprisingly, Latin American countries with strained relations with Washington have been the most receptive to Iranian overtures. These include Cuba, Nicaragua, Bolivia, and Venezuela, members of the so-called Bolivarian Alliance. Not only do these governments share Iran’s antipathy to the United States, but all are also under current or –in the case of Bolivia– proposed U.S. economic sanctions. 

Cuba

Whereas the 1979 revolution damaged Iran’s ties with most Latin American countries, it revitalized relations with Cuba, previously severed under the Shah’s government. Cuba was among the first countries to establish relations with the Islamic Republic, celebrating the Iranian Revolution as a “miraculous victory” and a source of “deep fright” for “international imperialism.” 

Cuba has since actively sided with Iran on the global stage. In 1979, it endorsed Iran’s entry into the Non-Aligned Movement, an organization of 120 states rejecting geopolitical affiliation with any global power blocs. Since 1985, Havana has voted against every United Nations resolution condemning Iran’s human rights abuses. In 2006 and 2009, as a member of the International Atomic Energy Agency’s (IAEA) Board of Governors, Cuba voted against resolutions criticizing Iran’s uranium enrichment program. Notably, the 2009 resolution was backed even by China and Russia. Cuba is even alleged to have jammed ‘Voice of America’ television broadcasts from the United States to Iran, though Havana has denied responsibility.

Havana, like Tehran, has long been under severe U.S. sanctions, with a “comprehensive economic embargo” declared by Washington in 1962. Beginning during the presidency of Mohammad Khatami (1997-2005), Iran extended annual lines of credit to Cuba. Starting at an initial sum of about €20 million (~US$22 million), the credit line was increased 25-fold by President Ahmadinejad to over €500 million (~US$544 million) in 2008, but was stopped in 2018. 

The two countries have also developed a modest trading relationship, generally centered around Cuban exports of pharmaceuticals, sugar, and tobacco and imports of manufactured products from Iran, such as machinery, pipes, and motor vehicle parts. Iran has yet to export goods to Cuba since 2018 but did import an estimated US$854,000 worth of Cuban goods in 2021.  

In January 2021, Iran and Cuba agreed to work together to produce COVID-19 vaccines. Cuba transferred the materials and technology for its Soberana 2 vaccine to Iran which would produce it en masse. According to Iranian state media, 8 million doses of the Cuban vaccine were produced in the country by the end of 2021. 

In more recent years, the two countries have expressed their intention to expand their trade and economic ties further. A direct shipping line between Iran and Cuba was announced in 2023, and 13 memoranda of understanding laying out plans for future cooperation, particularly in the areas of science and technology, healthcare, agriculture, and mining, were signed. Also, Cuba’s President Miguel Díaz-Canel said he would welcome the entry of Iranian consumer goods into the Cuban market. 

In December 2023, Díaz-Canel became the first Cuban leader to visit Tehran in 20 years, meeting with President Raisi and Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, who said that greater economic and political cooperation between Iran and Cuba, is needed now “more than ever before.”

Nicaragua

As in the case of Cuba, the Iranian Revolution boosted relations between Tehran and Nicaragua. This was because, like Iran, Nicaragua experienced a revolution in 1979, when the leftist Sandinista National Liberation Front, led by Daniel Ortega, overthrew the country’s U.S.-backed dynastic, authoritarian regime. When meeting with Iran’s President in June 2023, Ortega referred to the two countries as being of “sister revolutions.” 

Iran and Nicaragua established diplomatic relations and opened embassies in their respective capitals between 1983 and 1985. Ernesto Cardenal, then Nicaragua’s Minister of Culture, visited Tehran in 1983 and claims to have been only the second foreign official to have been granted a meeting with Ayatollah Khomeini since he took power. Iran’s Prime Minister Mir-Hossein Mousavi visited Ortega in Managua in 1985, allegedly discussing the shipment of Iranian small arms and oil to Nicaragua. 

Ortega’s electoral defeat in 1990 would precipitate a decade-long cooling of relations. However, they rekindled upon his return to the presidency in January 2007. President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad visited Nicaragua just three days after Ortega’s inauguration, announcing the reopening of embassies in the two countries. Ortega would visit Tehran in June of that year.

Like Cuba, Ortega’s Nicaragua has been politically supportive of Tehran. At the UN, it reversed the stance it held between 1992 and 2006 of voting in favor of annual Western-backed UN resolutions on Iran’s human rights record or abstaining. Since 2007, Managua has consistently opposed all such resolutions. President Ortega has also expressed his support for Iran’s controversial nuclear program. 

Nicaragua like Iran is under U.S. sanctions, although these generally target specific figures in the Sandinista government. The full U.S. embargo, imposed in 1985, was lifted in 1990. Nevertheless, Nicaragua remains one of the poorest countries in the Western Hemisphere and over the past 16 years, Iran has pledged considerable amounts of development aid and investment.

In 2007 alone, Tehran pledged well over US$1 billion worth of investments to Nicaragua, including funds for a hydroelectric facility and deepwater port, as well as 10,000 housing units and 4,000 tractors. These pledges have largely gone unfulfilled. 

Furthermore, trade between Iran and Nicaragua remains minimal. In the last fiscal year, the two countries conducted no direct trade at all. 2010 is the last year Iran and Nicaragua are recorded to have engaged in commerce, exchanging about US$1.4 million worth of goods. 

However, as recently as President Raisi’s visit to Nicaragua in June 2023, the two countries have continued vowing to increase cooperation. On June 30, Nicaragua’s legislature ratified agreements signed during Raisi’s visit calling for the creation of an Intergovernmental Joint Commission for Economic, Commercial, and Scientific-Technical Cooperation, as well as the exchange of medicines and medical equipment.

The New York Times reports that leaked U.S. intelligence documents purportedly reveal that Iran and Nicaragua have also recently discussed future military cooperation. The authenticity of these documents and the veracity of these claims however remain unclear. 

Bolivia

Bolivia has been called “Iran’s most successful foreign policy project in Latin America.” Despite having no long standing relationship with Iran like Cuba and Nicaragua, and only establishing diplomatic ties with it in 2007, Bolivia has quickly become one of Tehran’s closest Latin American allies. 

The catalyst for this was the election of Evo Morales as Bolivia’s president in 2006. Morales is a socialist and ardent critic of the United States, and has even described himself as “Washington’s nightmare.” On his first visit to Tehran in 2008, he described Iran and Bolivia as "two friendly and revolutionary countries," who are “staunchly opposed to U.S. hegemony.”

Under Morales, Bolivia became an outspoken backer of Iran in global politics. At the United Nations, La Paz reversed its two-decades-old trend of supporting or abstaining from annual resolutions condemning Iran, voting against all of them since 2009. Since 2010, Bolivia has also given its endorsement to Iran’s nuclear program. 

President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad visited Bolivia in September 2007, becoming the first and so far only Iranian leader to do so, signing agreements pledging a total of US1.1 billion in investments in Bolivia over the following five years. These investments were to have a particular focus on developing Bolivia’s energy and agricultural sectors. In 2010, Iran went further, promising to help Bolivia begin its own nuclear energy program. However, it is not clear if or to what extent these promises have been fulfilled. The head of Iran’s Chamber of Commerce acknowledged in 2021 that despite a promising start, Iranian investment in Bolivia has “gradually diminished” over the years.   

Overall, trade between the two countries has been modest. In 2021, Iran exported an estimated US$109,000 worth of goods to Bolivia, primarily carpets and packaged medications. This figure represents a considerable decline from 2019, when Bolivia took in more than US$500,000 worth of Iranian goods, and 2014 when Bolivia imported close to US$1 million of Iranian goods. Bolivia’s last recorded exports to Iran were in 2016 and consisted mostly of raw materials valued at between US$77,000 and US$105,000. 

Relations cooled between 2019 and 2020 after Morales was replaced as president by Jeanine Áñez, a pro-American conservative who closed Bolivia’s embassy in Iran. However, they quickly mended since Luis Arce, a socialist, was elected. In 2023, Tehran and La Paz intensified their partnership, signing a defense agreement, which reportedly would have Bolivia purchase Iranian drones, ostensibly meant for surveillance and border security. 

The agreement has sparked concern among opposition lawmakers in Bolivia and officials in neighboring Argentina, who say that the details of the deal are unclear and that it may actually involve transfers of missiles to Bolivia. Argentina is wary of Iranian influence in Latin America, as it blames Tehran for terrorist attacks in Buenos Aires in the 1990s. La Paz has denounced all criticisms of its defense agreement as “exaggerated.” 

Venezuela

Tehran’s alliance with Venezuela has arguably become Tehran’s most robust relationship in Latin America. During his 2023 visit to Caracas, President Raisi said the two countries share “common interests, common visions, and common enemies,” and have a “strategic relationship.” In turn, Venezuela’s leader Nicolas Maduro hailed Iran as “one of the most important emerging powers in the new world,” and said of the two countries, “together we will be invincible." 

Though Iran and Venezuela have a history of cordial relations and multilateral cooperation going back decades, the relationship intensified following the election of Hugo Chavez as Venezuela’s president in 1998. Chavez had a fervently anti-American worldview, denouncing the United States as an “empire,” with “hegemonic pretensions,” and a “sword hanging over [the world’s] heads.” In 2005, he called Iran a “brother country,” that can count on Venezuela’s “support, our affection, and our solidarity” in the face of Washington’s “threats.” 

Like Iran’s other Latin American allies, Venezuela has backed Tehran in international bodies. Since 2000, it has opposed every annual UN resolution on Iran’s human rights violations. In 2005, 2006, and 2009, while a member of the IAEA’s Board of Governors, Venezuela voted against resolutions critical of Iran’s nuclear program. Venezuela has also used its regional influence to help facilitate Iranian engagement with other Latin American countries, particularly Bolivia. Israel, one of Iran’s chief Middle Eastern adversaries, has denounced Caracas as a “base for the Iranian advance on the American continent.” 

Of even greater concern to Iran’s adversaries, has been its military ties with Venezuela. In 2012, then-President Hugo Chavez confirmed that Venezuela was collaborating with Iran and “other allied countries” to produce drones. He asserted that the drones would be exclusively for surveillance and exploratory purposes, adding that “we don't have any plans to harm anyone.” 

However, defense officials from Israel and the United States have claimed to have evidence that Tehran has been sending offensive weaponry to Venezuela, such as precision-guided missiles, small naval craft, as well as military personnel. In 2023, Washington sanctioned an Iranian cargo vessel for allegedly transporting Iranian weapons to Venezuela. Moreover, Venezuela is suspected of being a key fundraising base for Hezbollah, a Lebanese militant group considered a proxy of Iran, and accused of having carried out terrorist attacks in Argentina with Tehran’s backing.

While their military ties may be opaque, Iran and Venezuela have developed an indisputably considerable economic relationship. In the 2022-23 fiscal year, Venezuela was Iran’s top export destination in Latin America, sending US$118 million worth of goods. Iranian imports from Venezuela were valued at US$816,000. These figures represent a nearly 200% increase over the value of bilateral trade in the previous year. 

Venezuela, like Iran, is under sanctions by the United States, and the two countries have pledged to increase economic cooperation. In 2023, plans were announced to eventually grow the total value of annual bilateral trade to US$20 billion. These include the export of 200,000 Iranian cars to Venezuela over the next five years. 

Caracas has also been purchasing Iranian oil and gas since 2020. Despite being one of the largest oil producers in the world, U.S. sanctions and years of local mismanagement have degraded Venezuela’s energy industry.  Between 2021 and 2023, it is estimated that Iran sent 28 million barrels of gas to Venezuela. Tehran has also announced its intention to invest in revitalizing Venezuela’s oil refineries. 

Other Latin American Countries

Iran has engaged with other Latin American countries, but these relationships have been far more complicated and less consistent over the past two decades than those between Tehran and the Bolivarian Alliance, where pro-Iranian leaders and parties are either entrenched through autocratic political systems or popular enough to have remained electorally dominant for an extended period. 

Brazil

Iran enjoys a strong trade relationship with Brazil, consisting mostly of Iranian imports of Brazilian produce such as sugar, corn, and soybeans in exchange for fertilizers. The value of trade between the two countries was estimated at US$5 billion in 2022, roughly double its value the year before. 

Politically, the two countries have some common interests. They are now both members of BRICS, an association of emergent economies widely seen as a counterbalance to the West. However, Tehran has never been able to develop a political relationship with Brazil as close as it has with the Bolivarian nations. In international institutions, Brazil generally abstains on matters dealing with Iran, such as UN and IAEA resolutions

Also, the quality of relations has varied between Brazilian presidents, warming under current leader Luis Inacio Lula Da Silva, as it did during his first term between 2003 and 2011 while cooling under his successor Dilma Rousseff (2011-2016), a vocal critic of Iran’s human rights record, and under pro-U.S. conservatives Michel Temer and Jair Bolsonaro. 

Ecuador

Ecuador’s shift in its approach to Iran was even more pronounced. Ecuador was part of the early-2000s ‘pink tide,’ electing leftist Rafael Correa, as President in 2007. Quito was also an early member of the Bolivarian Alliance and had a burgeoning political and economic relationship with Iran. Relations have cooled since 2017, when Correa was succeeded by Vice President Lenin Moreno, who withdrew Ecuador from the Bolivarian Alliance, improved ties with the United States, and stopped opposing Western-backed UN resolutions condemning Iran. Under Presidents Guillermo Lasso (2021-2023) and Daniel Noboa (2023-), Ecuador began voting in favor of these resolutions. However, Iran and Ecuador have discussed strengthening bilateral ties as recently as November 2023. 

Argentina

The case of Argentina is unique in that cooperation between Buenos Aires and Tehran was arguably greater in some ways before the 2000s ‘pink tide’ than after. In 1987, the two countries began collaborating in the field of nuclear research, over the objections of the United States. Argentina supplied Iran with a nuclear reactor core, nuclear scientists, and training in Argentina for Iranian scientists. 

The collaboration ended in 1992 after a car bomb at the Israeli embassy in Buenos Aires killed 29 people and injured hundreds. The militant group Hezbollah, with backing from Iran, is widely believed to have perpetrated the attack. Another bombing, also linked to Hezbollah and Iran was carried out in 1994, at a Jewish community center in Buenos Aires killing 85. Tehran has denied responsibility, calling the accusations “baseless” and “ inventions of newspapers.”

These attacks have left a blot on Argentine-Iranian relations which endures to this day. It was President Néstor Kirchner, a pink tide leader elected in 2003, who publicly denounced Iran in a 2007 speech at the UN General Assembly, announcing that Buenos Aires had identified six Iranian citizens involved in the bombings and was calling for their arrest. 

The accused included high-ranking Iranian officials, such as former President Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani, a former Iranian foreign minister, and Gen. Ahmad Vahidi, who today is Iran’s Interior Minister. Kirchner added that “unfortunately, the Islamic Republic of Iran has to date failed to offer the required cooperation with the Argentine justice system.” 

Relations between Tehran and Buenos Aires would improve somewhat under Kirchner’s wife and successor, Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner who became President in 2007. Mrs. Kirchner, allegedly with encouragement from Venezuela’s Hugo Chavez, expanded trade with Iran and signed an agreement in 2013 calling for the two countries to investigate the 1990s bombings together through a joint commission. Opponents argued that such a commission would inevitably exonerate Tehran, and the agreement was struck down as unconstitutional by an Argentine court in 2014. 

Mrs. Kirchner was accused of covering up Iran’s involvement in the attacks, and she would be indicted in 2017 on charges of treason. The charges were dropped in 2021. 

Today, relations between Argentina and Iran remain cool. Although they maintain a sizable trade relationship, worth over US$200 million; politically Buenos Aires has expressed opposition to Iran’s dealings in Latin America, annually joins Western countries in voting for United Nations resolutions condemning Tehran, and in 2022, impounded a Venezuelan plane, sanctioned by the U.S. and allegedly containing Iranian agents, turning over the aircraft to the U.S. in 2024. 

Media

Iran’s activities in Latin America have not been limited to building relationships with governments. It has also worked to spread its message directly to the people of the region. In 2010, Iran’s state-run television network launched HispanTV, a Spanish-language platform broadcasting 24/7 across Latin America, as well as on social media. It reportedly has 300 million viewers across more than twenty countries. 

HispanTV presents news and political commentary highly critical of the United States and Israel and portrays Iran in a positive light and as a like-minded ally to Latin America. Some analysts have described HispanTV as part of an “echo chamber” created by Iran and its allies to broadcast a unified narrative across the region. 

HispanTV, along with Venezuela’s TeleSur and Russia’s RT en Español, have been found to present articles and reports from the same pool of contributors, quote each other several times per day, and in some cases, repeat the same stories verbatim. 

How Has The United States Responded?

Predictably, the United States has reacted to Iran’s inroads in Latin America with watchful concern. However, over the years American leaders have disagreed both on the best strategies with which to counter Iran and on the degree to which its Latin American activities actually threaten the United States. 

During the administration of President George W. Bush (2001-2009), Washington attempted to prevent Iranian diplomatic inroads in Latin America through warnings to regional leaders over Tehran’s allegedly sinister intentions. For example, in 2007 and 2008, U.S. diplomats reportedly urged Bolivia and Brazil not to intensify associations with Tehran, citing its ties to terrorist organizations, alleged intentions of developing nuclear weapons, and the threat Iran poses to U.S. security. These efforts were unsuccessful. 

During President Barack Obama’s tenure (2009-2017), Washington shifted strategies, seeking to counter the influence of Iran, and its other geopolitical rivals in Latin America, by expanding its diplomatic engagement with the region, including with countries with which it has had strained relations, most notably Cuba. 

This approach came under fire from U.S. officials following a foiled 2011 plot, allegedly by Iran, to assassinate Saudi Arabia’s Ambassador to the United States, on U.S. soil, through hiring Mexican drug cartel hitmen. Director of National Intelligence, James Clapper argued that the plot demonstrated that Iranian officials, “probably including Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei” are “now more willing to conduct an attack in the United States.” 

Rep. Pat Meehan (R-PA), then the U.S. House of Representatives Subcommittee on Counterterrorism and Intelligence chairman warned that Washington “may not fully be considering the gravity of the Iranian threat.”

In 2012, Congress passed the Countering Iran in the Western Hemisphere Act, which states that “it shall be the policy of the United States to use a comprehensive government-wide strategy to counter Iran’s growing hostile presence and activity in the Western Hemisphere.” The U.S. Department of State was required to develop this strategy and conduct a comprehensive analysis of Iran’s activities in Latin America. 

However, the U.S. Government Accountability Office reported in 2014 that the government’s execution of this directive was deficient. In response, the State Department argued that in many cases, “the consensus of the intelligence community was that there was not an identifiable threat to counter.” 

This sentiment has at times been echoed by lawmakers of both parties. Sen. Marco Rubio (R-FL), Ranking Member of the United States Senate Committee on Foreign Relations has said that “we need to begin by making sure we don't exaggerate things. Iran really is not capable of doing much on its own in [Latin America]. All these promises they make…they haven't kept almost any of them.” Rep. Bennie Thompson (D-MS), Ranking Member of the U.S. House Committee on Homeland Security, said, “we must be careful to stick to the facts. We must not overstate, nor overreact to the threat we currently face from Iran.” 

Washington still does not appear to have adopted a dedicated strategy aimed at expunging Iran from Latin America. It does however, continue to verbally protest some acts of regional cooperation with Tehran, such as in February 2023 when it urged Brazil to refuse a port call by two Iranian warships, accused of having “facilitated illegal trade and terrorist activities.” These protests were not successful. 

The U.S. has at times taken more aggressive measures, such as in 2020 when it seized four Iranian tankers bound for Venezuela and their cargo of some 1.1 million barrels of oil. The U.S. did not reveal how or where the tankers were seized and later sold the oil for US$40 million. 

Future Outlook

In all, Iran so far has relatively little to show for its efforts in Latin America. Trade with the region remains modest, many commitments of investment have gone unfulfilled, and outside of the Bolivarian Alliance, political support for Tehran remains limited. 

Although many countries in the region still have left-leaning governments, the zealous anti-Americanism seen in the early 2000s has tempered, as has the influence of the Bolivarian Alliance, particularly since the death of Hugo Chavez in 2013 and the floundering of Venezuela’s economy. In fact, polling data reveals that approval of the United States in Latin America has been growing in recent years. 

Therefore, if Tehran intends to continue attempting to build its relations with Latin America around anti-Americanism, it may find its successes meager. Such successes will be further undermined if Tehran, as it has over the past two decades, makes commitments it has not the will or resources to honor. 

For the United States, vigilant concern about Iran’s activities and intentions so close to its territory is warranted, but as some U.S. officials have noted, must not be overstated. As Eldar Mamedov, former European Parliament foreign affairs advisor notes, some U.S. political and media figures tend to cite as threats to the U.S., what are ultimately “trivial” events such as the visit of the Iranian warships to Brazil. 

Furthermore, as Mamedov points out, what political progress Tehran has made in Latin America since the early 2000s, is attributable in no small part to failed U.S. policies in the region. Former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton has made similar arguments. 

The U.S. may be better served by expanding its engagement with Latin America, as opposed to simply reacting to the inroads of Iran and other rivals and relying so heavily on tactics such as sanctions and isolation of its regional adversaries which have proven ineffective and unpopular in the region as a whole.