The Iranian revolution of 1978-9 remains one of the greatest popular upheavals of the twentieth century. When it came to pass, Iran had been a client state of US imperialist for almost three decades, the regime of Mohammad Reza Pahlavi proudly fronting the anti-communist cause in the wider Middle East region while crushing progressive social forces within. A societal revolt against the hated regime, and self-anointed Shehanshah (King of Kings), was the logical conclusion to one of the darker periods of Iranian history.
In almost 40 years since the Revolution, Iran has consistently been derided in the western mainstream as an illiberal threat to ‘civilisation’. The reduction of the Iranian people, and indeed the depth of Iranian national consciousness, to the repressive theocratic regime that has ruled the country since 1980, has been conscious and deliberate. US imperialism, its Zionist outpost in occupied Palestine, as well as lackey Arab rulers have all demonised Iran to justify sanctions, conspiracy, and direct military incursions.
Seen thus, the bombs dropped on Iran by Zionist warplanes in late June, represented the continuation of a sustained policy of aggression. The exchange of missiles that followed between Iran and the Zionist entity, as well as the night-long bombardment campaign by the US on what it alleged were nuclear enrichment sites, may not have escalated into a wider regional – or global – conflagration. But US-Israeli aggression will inevitably rear its ugly head again in the not-too-distant future.
There is no secret to what the Empire and its Israeli outpost want – to eliminate the one clear challenger to their power in the Muslim world. Before and during the June attack, the western mainstream shamelessly platformed the exiled son of the long-deposed Pahlavi Dynasty. Meanwhile, in various public addresses during the attack, Zionist butcher-in-chief Bibi Netanyahu repeatedly spoke directly to the ‘brave’ Iranian people, attempting to instigate an internal revolt against the Islamic Republic. The ‘civilised’ west no longer seeks to even remotely mask its regime change intentions.
So-called ‘humanitarian intervention’ has been the modus operandi of US imperialism across the world since the 1990s. While in most cases these interventions have taken the form of brazen imperialist wars to secure strategic and economic interests, in other cases – like the Rwandan and Bosnian genocides – there has been either conspicuous non-intervention or wilful complicity with local tyrants.
With the onset of the so-called ‘war on terror’ in 2001, the Muslim world once again became the primary locus of US imperial strategy. Afghanistan was invaded and oc- AUGUST 2025 cupied replete slogans that brown Muslim women needed to be saved from brown Muslim men. What became the longest war in US history ended formally in 2021 with Washington consciously handing the country back to the very same Taliban that had been decried as enemies of civilisation in 2001.
Further catastrophes played out in Iraq, Syria, and Libya, the trumped up lie about Saddam Hussein possessing ‘weapons of mass destruction’ (WMD) representing a stark parallel to the fear mongering about Iran’s nuclear capability in the current conjuncture. Till this day, war-ravaged countries like Lebanon and Yemen continue to be periodically subjected to Zionist and US-backed Saudi aggression respectively.
Iran is much bigger than all of the above-mentioned countries that have been ravaged by imperialism. It exercises huge influence over Shi’a militant organisations, including Hezbollah and the Houthis of Yemen, whilst explicitly supporting Hamas and the Palestinian cause more generally. It controls major waterways like the Strait of Hormuz, through which at least 20 per cent of global oil supply travels on a daily basis.
The recent attack on Iran by Washington and Tel Aviv made clear that any substantive attempt to subjugate Iran will further destabilise the region and the world. US imperialist wars since WWII have always been fought in the name of a larger ‘pax Americana’, which in fact has been catastrophic for large parts of of the Muslim world, East Asia, Latin America, and Africa.
Pakistan’s militarised ruling class has for most of our tortured history been a willing junior partner to the Empire. General Ayub Khan’s dictatorship retained very close ties with the Shah of Iran; Turkey, Pakistan, and Iran formed the anti-communist troika faithfully doing Washington’s bidding throughout the 1960s. Later, the dictatorships of Zia ul Haq and Pervez Musharraf immensely damaged Pakistani society by aligning with Washington to prosecute wars in Afghanistan.
The early June meeting between the army chief and Donald Trump in Washington – the first time that a sitting US president has met one-on-one with another country’s top general – suggests that the Pakistani establishment is keen to once again make Pakistan into the handmaiden of imperialism, presumably in exchange for crypto and mineral exploration contracts. The absurd announcement by the Government of Pakistan which followed outlining its plan to nominate Trump for the Nobel Peace Prize rekindled the spectre of Ayub Khan’s infamous ‘Friends not Masters’. It is telling that Bibi Netanyahu then proceeded to follow Islamabad and nominate Trump for the same.
In the short-term, Pakistan’s most oppressed peoples have already suffered the fallouts of US-Zionist aggression. Iran shares an almost 900km border with Pakistan, which remained closed for almost a week due to the Israeli attack. Cross-border trade is arguably, the biggest livelihood source for a vast majority of ordinary people across Balochistan, especially its western parts. Even by conservative estimates, goods worth $3 billion move across this border annually.
Most of Balochistan uses Iranian diesel and petrol. A range of other products also come in, from across the border. While economic ‘experts’ and bureaucrats lament the supposed loss to the exchequer from this ‘black’ economy, they conveniently neglect the fact that Balochistan has been pillaged for its rich mineral resources by the nexus of state and capital while the local population, select middlemen excluded, has gotten only deprivation and subjugation. Local fishing communities, for instance, have seen the tuna sector almost completely stagnate due to the short border closure.
The situation remains dire on the other side of the border too. The theocratic regime in Iran has long brutalised ethnic Baloch, along with women, non-Shi’a minorities, and political dissidents more generally. Like the Kurds, the Baloch continue to be subjugated by states whilst treated as pawns in geopolitical games, pushed to the wall and then criminalised to no end.
Yet whatever their similarities, Iran and Pakistan, are different because the former is standing up to the Empire while the latter is seeking deals with it. The truth is that most Muslim rulers, including Pakistan’s, have already abandoned the people of Iran, forget its regime. Those who continue to insist that Iran’s mullahs should be deposed no matter what the costs deliberately obfuscate the long history of US imperialism destroying entire societies in the name of ‘democracy’ and ‘human rights’; Iran’s future would look no different if a regime change operation was in effect.
The people of Iran have their own history of struggle, and they will chart a future beyond the so-called Islamic Republic. The US Empire and its Zionist outpost have repeatedly set this struggle back. Meanwhile, Pakistan’s working people – especially, in the long-suffering peripheries – will only be pushed further towards the abyss if the generals who rule the country condemn the country to the role of ‘frontline state’, yet again.
The writer is an author and teacher at Quaid-e-Azam University, Islamabad.
