Predictions that US sanctions will drive Russia and Iran closer to each other appear to be on target. Moscow and Tehran are already coordinating closely on negotiations to end the civil war in Syria, and they may consider strengthening their cooperation in other spheres once Damascus is squared away. 

The US Congress' Countering America’s Adversaries Through Sanctions Act (HR 3364) revitalized talk of a strategic relationship between Russia and Iran. Russian analysts and policymakers have been attentively studying the experience of Iran, whose government and people have been grappling for many years with the consequences of international and unilateral US sanctions. Moscow has long tried to capture something useful from Iran’s experience, but eventually tends to conclude that Iran’s case is very different economically, geopolitically and in terms of political organization and industrial development. Thus, the argument goes, even if some experience is to be borrowed, it should be done carefully and with duly appraised adjustments.

Yet a sense of common destiny between Moscow and Tehran has been on the rise since Russia annexed Crimea in 2014. American and European sanctions against Russia at that time made Russian and Iranian leaders ponder the prospects of a greater consolidation in their complicated relationship. Now that sense is being reinforced by new sanctions from a common antagonist — the United States.

Iran proved that a country can live under sanctions and show growth in gross domestic product, even when actual development is in deep stagnation. Previous sanctions against Iran, though, targeted mostly domestic projects and its oil exports.