Editorial

The United States and Israel have launched an unprovoked war of aggression against Iran, a state that was not threatening their interests. This is a war to destroy the Iranian state and is waged in such a way as to cause death and destruction to the political leadership, the state apparatus, civil society and the civilian population, including a barbaric attack on a girls’ school, citizen gatherings, a desalinisation plant, an oil refinery (releasing toxic gases over civilians) and the homes of ordinary people. By any standard it is a crime of almost unimaginable proportions. The moral case against the aggression on Iran is self-evident.

‘Labour Affairs’ intends to put the case for supporting Iran on a pragmatic as well as a moral basis and here again the case for supporting Iran is overwhelming. In the March issue of LA Dave Gardner made the point that support for the war on Russia in Ukraine had already cost the UK £200 billion since 2022, with further losses to come for both consumers and producers through inflated energy prices. The widespread fury of the British electorate against parties who have managed our affairs so incompetently has led to a degree of political instability which is likely to increase.

Iran has not threatened our interests. Our interests depend on maintaining good relations with Iran, in part because our ability to access oil, gas and fertiliser depends on not attacking them. However, we are correctly perceived to be doing so by Iran. The UK has provided and continues to provide logistical support to the US aggression against Iran. A country that assists another country in waging war on a third country is a co-belligerent against that third country. When Iran retaliates against that co-belligerent it is acting within its right in international law to defend itself. To say that the UK is entitled to take defensive measures resulting from its own support for aggression is simply to say that it intends to intensify its aggression against Iran. Indeed, that is how the Iranians see us, as a hostile state dedicated to destroying them and they have taken action accordingly.

A key element in Iran’s fight for survival is to choke off the Strait of Hormuz to prevent shipment of oil, gas and other products to the rest of the world. Our faltering economy depends on these to continue operating at all, let alone to flourish. The next step in Iran’s war for survival, already underway, is the destruction of extraction, production and refining facilities in the Gulf States. When this is completed, the world will permanently lose energy capacity. Unless the war is stopped we will lose access to energy and fertiliser and will fall into an economic slump along with Europe and much of the world. We are looking at a worldwide recession and quite possibly an economic depression which may take years to emerge from. In the meantime, vulnerable countries will face starvation. 

On the grounds of self-interest alone, the case for opposing the aggression against Iran and providing diplomatic support for them to extract favourable terms is overwhelming. These terms will have to include the permanent removal of the US military presence from the Middle East. The longer the war goes on the greater the economic destruction will be and the longer it will take to put it right. Our economy is already faltering, in large part because of our obsessional support for the war against Russia. Our participation in yet another imperialist war against Iran threatens far greater economic destruction. The people of the UK need to understand the operation of cause and effect in this case. Supporting imperialist ventures on behalf of countries such as the US and Israel that do not have our interests at heart leads to hikes in the cost of energy. In the case of Ukraine this is self-imposed through sanctions. In the case of Iran it comes from their retaliation against our own aggression. The results are the same, economic decline and distress for the population of Britain. We are governed by a political class that is effectively controlled by two foreign powers. This means that they will never govern in our interests unless those interests coincide with ours, which will be a very rare occurrence indeed. The time has come to remove this corrupt political class and to promote the interest of the British people.