US Vows to 'Collapse' Iran's Economy and Presses China
The US Treasury secretary, Scott Bessent, said Washington would impose its “toughest sanctions in history” to crush Iran’s economy and even “collapse” its government, and pressed China to fall in behind the campaign. Beijing, Iran’s biggest oil buyer, publicly rejected the strategy as ineffective. Tehran dismissed the threats as a distraction from America’s own problems and warned they endangered “the entire global economy”.
The rhetoric marks a further hardening, from squeezing Iran’s economy to openly seeking the fall of its government, a goal that recalls past American misadventures in regime change and unnerves even some allies. The crux is China, which has kept buying Iranian oil in defiance of sanctions and has no interest in helping Washington tighten the noose; without Beijing, any global embargo leaks. The “with us or against us” framing pressures third countries to choose, but many will resist being conscripted into an American campaign. Oil eased slightly even so, a sign markets doubt the threat can be fully enforced. Watch whether the promised sanctions land and how China and Iran route around them.