In the past four decades, the US-Iran relations have been hostile, especially after Donald Trump took office as president in 2017. Since 1979, Washington's official policy toward Iran has been predicated on containment, push-back, and change of behavior. However, Iran usually perceives the US policy regarding itself in terms of regime change or metamorphosis. The United States has countered Iran through coercive diplomacy, crippling sanctions, military blockade, delegitimization, isolation, and demonization. The present paper aims to investigate the antagonism between the two countries in Donald Trump's administration. The main reasons behind Trump's maximum pressure campaign against Iran and Iran’s perception of this attitude constitute the main research questions addressed in this paper. The findings show that the two countries have different understandings of their hostilities. Although the US preference in Trump’s era for Iran was regime change, it would settle for a non-challenging or so-called a normal Iran. But Iran perceived the US policy as undermining its independence, identity, and existence. In fact Iran perceived Trump’s gesture on negotiation or making new deal as just a propaganda show. This paradigmatic different outlooks has blocked diplomacy. The present paper, through a descriptive-analytic method, elaborates on this antinomy mainly from Iranian side.
