EDITORIAL
Iranian Workers—Between the Devil and the Deep Blue Sea

Mar 8, 2026

The U.S. war machine has attacked Iran.

Donald Trump blames the Iranian regime, which, he says, is headed by “a vicious group of very hard, terrible people.”

To American soldiers, Trump had this to say: “Lives of courageous American heroes may be lost, and we may have casualties. That often happens in war.” Yes, it does, and people like Trump are never the ones who pay its price.

To the Iranian people, Trump had this to say: “When we are finished [bombing], take over your government. This will be probably your only chance for generations.... America is backing you with overwhelming strength and devastating force.... This is the moment for action. Do not let it pass.”

It’s true, the Iranian regime, a regime based on reactionary religious law, is vicious. The Iranian people don’t need Donald Trump to tell them that. Over the last eight years, they have taken to the streets four times in mobilizations that aimed at getting rid of that regime. But their goal was certainly not to bring the U.S. back into Iran.

Forty-seven years ago, the Iranian population had engaged itself in a vast social uprising that chased the Shah of Iran from power. Put in place by an earlier military coup, armed and paid for by the U.S., the Shah had ruled Iran for two decades, using widespread torture and prison. His regime protected U.S. and British oil companies.

In 1978–79, the strongest detachments of the popular revolution which brought him down were workers in Iran’s heavy industry, and especially its oil industry.

When the mullahs put themselves forward as defenders of the poor and opponents of U.S. and British oil companies, left organizations in Iran fell in line behind them, calling for “national unity” against imperialism. The working class was disoriented, the revolution hijacked. The mullahs set up a so-called “religious republic,” based on reactionary religious law.

As the Iranian working class discovered, it was not enough to drive a hated tyrant from power. It was necessary for the working class to organize its own power, to reorganize society. This wasn’t done; the opportunity for social revolution was lost.

To keep popular support, the mullahs nationalized British and U.S. oil companies, using some of the money for social support for the poor.

In response, the U.S. encouraged Iraq to invade Iran. The war that developed lasted eight years and cost half a million lives on the two sides.

Left in a shambles, its people still more impoverished, much of its industry turned over to war production, Iran struggled to hang onto its nationalized oil industry.

When the regime which had nationalized oil didn’t collapse, the U.S. sought other ways to get its oil. Sometimes, Iran’s oil shipments were blockaded. Sometimes the West’s financial markets froze out Iran. Sometimes Israel, with U.S. backing, carried out bombing. Sometimes, the U.S. offered deals to the Iranian regime.

This put the Iranian working class between the devil and the deep blue sea, between enemy #1, the regime of the mullahs that repressed them at home; and enemy #2, the big imperialist powers, the U.S. first of all, which impoverished the country.

Today, Trump pretends to be a friend of the Iranian people, calling on them to come back out in the street in support of the U.S. war, pretending the U.S. will support them if they go up against the Iranian regime. The Iranian people have already seen how useless that support was two months ago, when they were left dangling, facing the regime’s violence. Tens of thousands died.

No, the only thing the Iranian working class can count on is itself—and the links it can forge with other workers. Just as the only ones American workers can count on are ourselves and the links we can have with other workers.

The wars that imperialism carries out are aimed, among other things, at dividing workers from each other, inside each country and across national borders. Our perspective must be to forge and reinforce the unity of our class. Our strength lies in our possibility to become an international class.