I yield to no-one in my dislike of the Iranian govt., and in my desire to have our govt. go and break some of their stuff. There’s an aspect of this business about seizing U.S. citizens that nags at me, though. Which is, that they seem to be Iranian citizens also. Does Iran recognize dual citizenship?

Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesman Mohammad-Ali Hosseini rejected international protests against the arrests saying its judiciary had every right to try the detainees as Iranians only, as Iran does not acknowledge dual citizenship.

Yet Stanley Renshon’s 2005 book The 50% American, which I have always taken to be authoritative on this point, lists Iran as one of those nations that do recognize dual citizenship (Table 1.1). And whether Iran does or not, we really should not. Rhetorically, we don’t: My Oath of Citizenship required me to “entirely renounce and abjure all allegiance and fidelity to any foreign prince, potentate, state or sovereignty, of whom or which I have heretofore been a subject or citizen.” Plainly these hostages violated that oath. However, in practice the U.S. approach to naturalized citizenship is a bit like one of those square-the-circle medieval formulas about Christ’s nature: You may lawfully be a citizen of only one nation, and also of more than one, both at the same time. Should we look after our own, even when it seems they have violated their Naturalization Oaths? I’m inclined, grudgingly, to think we should. If we had a less sloppy, more rigorous and consistent attitude to U.S . citizenship, though, we wouldn’t lay ourselves open to these situations.