The Biden Administration has negotiated the release of five Americans held in Evin prison in return for releasing funds held by South Korea in compliance with US sanctions. If you really want to know what happened, I would read this interview with Brett McGurk by Jason Rezaian, who was himself held for over a year in Evin.
First, diplomacy is complex and nuanced. One state rarely has the ability to truly and completely influence another. There are levers that can be pulled, but each state's sovereignty inoculates them from control by the other. In this case, the Biden Administration has prioritized bringing home as many Americans as they can. According to McGurk, the funds released are limited in what Iran can do with them, but Iran says differently. Time will tell.
What I can say, confidently, is that the Right Wing Wurlitzer will have a complete and utter freakout over this. Almost all of it will be hypocritical bullshit. McGurk noted how often similar actions were taken under Trump, but of course, accusations of hypocrisy have never daunted the GOP and their minions in the media.
There is only one real criticism of this move and that is that it does reward hostage taking. That is undeniably true. The question is whether Iran will use this deal to take more hostages. If they do - or really if any regime does - then the policy was a failure. If not, STFU, Biden brought Americans home. However, he brought Americans home from Afghanistan and people dinged him for that.
Americans are, by and large, ignorant of the world beyond American borders. We saw the problem with this during our disastrous invasion of Iraq, when even American officials had no clue what they are doing. Still, being ignorant is hardly a barrier to have an opinion, so I would expect there to be some misplaced outrage over this action. Sadly. I mean, it may not work, but that seems premature.
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