Nick Fountain

This contraction, which was largely the effect of the biggest, most comprehensive sanctions yet.

Better tailored sanctions with international cooperation.

So policymakers came up with a staggered version of sanctions that pressured other countries to reduce how much oil they imported from Iran.

But only bit by bit, one chunk every six months.

And if those countries refused to join in on these staggered oil sanctions, the U.S.

would sanction them, their banks.

So the countries complied.

Which basically meant, do you prefer doing business with Iran or the U.S.?

Your call.

Iran was now falling behind its peer countries.

All these emerging economies around the world in Latin America and Southeast Asia were emerging.

And Iran wasn't.

It was backsliding.

The Iranian people were upset.

And in 2013, Iranians surprised the world by voting in a president who wanted to ease tensions with the U.S.

and the world.

The president in Iran is number two to the Ayatollah, and this president was a critic of Iran's nuclear program and its geopolitical costs.

The Iran nuclear deal seemed like this big triumph of negotiation and nonviolent tools.

The sanctions had worked.

But now that we're done with our brief economic history, we are going to walk you through a few ways that sanctions didn't work quite exactly as the U.S.