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| Volume 56 Number 3, February 7, 2026 | ARCHIVE | HOME | JBCENTRE | SUBSCRIBE |
Huge image in Tehran - "If you sow the wind, you
will reap the whirlwind."
As we write, the US warmonger Trump continues the dangerous US war escalation with military build-up in the Middle East threatening Iran. Trump boasts of sending a "massive armada" with deployment of the aircraft carrier USS Abraham Lincoln, accompanied by three destroyers, including guided-missile destroyers and additional ships. These have also been supplemented by reports of "specialist military" jets and helicopters arriving through US bases in Britain and Germany showing the cowardice and complicity of British and the EU ally vassals in all US threats against Iran. This is the reality of the crimes against peace by Trump and his allies. It is in fact now support for Trump's lashing out with even more extreme violence, destruction and obliteration of anything which stands in his way.
Al Quds Day - Tehran 2024
The Prime Minister, Sir Keir Starmer, whilst in China, when asked if Trump's actions were right, refused to say, only commenting: "We all agree that ensuring that Iran doesn't get that nuclear programme is the number one priority, and that's what we're working on." Starmer did not refer to Britain's so-called concern about Iranian demonstrators. He instead emphasised the nuclear pretext to interfere in Iran just as Blair had used "weapons of mass destruction" as a pretext to invade Iraq in 2003.
Last week the EU dutifully designated the Iranian defence forces, the Iranian Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC), a "terrorist" organisation. The British government on Monday, February 2, moved to impose further sanctions on Iran and Iranians [1]. Then on Tuesday, the government led a debate in Parliament [2] where the whole cartel party system condemned Iran for "attacks on protesters", and any parallel drawn with the arrest and demonising of pro-Palestine demonstrators here was noticeable by its absence.
In the debate, only one MP, Richard Foord, managed to condemn Trump's threats to attack Iran saying: "In response to the unilateral US action in Venezuela, the Government merely said that they were waiting to establish all the facts. Meanwhile President Trump said that he does not need international law, and that he is constrained only by his own morality or conscience. In advance of any US unilateral action against Iran, will the Minister reassure the House that this time the Government will speak up for the use of force when it is in compliance with international law?" The Parliamentary under secretary, Hamish Falconer tried to claim in reply: "As the House knows, the Government are a strong supporter of international law. Everything we do is consistent with that principle, but for the reasons that I set out to the Shadow Foreign Secretary, I will not be commenting on hypothetical scenarios." In other words, the reality is that the government and the cartel party system in Westminster support Trump, but fantasise that to do so is supporting "international law". In reply, Iran has stood firm. It has said it will strike US bases and aircraft carriers immediately in response to any attack.
Chicago, January 3, 2026
Iran and its Islamic Republic has always responded with the full force of the heroic Iranian people and its 1979 revolution, the anniversary of which we celebrate this week on February 11. In nearly 50 years, the Islamic Republic of Iran has never bent but continued to resist the criminal actions of the Anglo-US imperialists, and the Israeli regime who continue their genocidal murder of the Palestinian people with the support of the US, Britain and the EU. This week marks the anniversary of the overthrow of the Pahlavi regime in 1979 by the Iranian people. The celebrations known as the Fajr decade (Ten Days of Dawn), run annually from February 1st to 11th (12th to 22nd of Bahman in the Persian calendar). The referendum that followed in March 1979 established the Islamic Republic of Iran.
The brutal Pahlavi monarchy had itself been brought to power on August 19, 1953, by a coup organised by the Anglo-US imperialists to seize back control of Iranian oil fields and Iran's strategic position in the Middle East. The coup d'état overthrew the government of Prime Minister of Iran Mohammad Mosaddegh, who had defended Iran, its oil and resources, and was left to die in prison.
Since the Iranian revolution, the Anglo-US imperialists alongside the Israeli regime and their European allies have never ceased in the attempts to destroy the Islamic Republic. The Revolutionary Communist Party of Britain (Marxist-Leninist) has consistently maintained its stand demanding an end to imperialist intervention in the Middle East, specifically campaigning under banners such as "Hands off Iran" and "Hands off the Middle East" and "Free Palestine" and supporting the resistance. The Party has always argued that Iran and its people should be left alone to determine their own path and that the focus should be on stopping US-British interference and aggression. The Party characterises "Western" media reports regarding Iran's nuclear programme as disinformation for war, comparing it to the build-up to the 2003 Iraq invasion and the so-called accusation that Iraq possessed "weapons of mass destruction" used to justify the Anglo-US invasion and occupation of Iraq. The Party has always argued that meddling by British and American governments is the primary cause of regional turmoil.
London, January 31, 2026
When Iran announced the starting of live-fire military exercises in the Strait of Hormuz, a critical maritime chokepoint through which a substantial portion of the world's oil passes, US forces had immediately been taken by surprise. These drills overlap with US movements, and noticeably blind-sided and forced US military concerns over "potential miscalculations" in the congested waters and a demand that the Iranian military, the IRGC, should act with "professionalism". In Tehran, a huge image is being displayed showing a bird's-eye view of an aircraft carrier with damaged and exploding fighter planes on its flight deck. The deck is strewn with bodies and streaked with blood that trails into the water behind the ship to form a pattern reminiscent of the stripes of the American flag. A slogan is emblazoned across one corner: "If you sow the wind, you will reap the whirlwind." All this shows why Trump was forced to retreat to diplomatic talks with Iran which are said to be going ahead on Friday, February 6.
As Workers' Weekly reported, condemning the Israel and US bombing of Iran last year in their 12-day attack on Iran on June 12, 2025: "Israel is a terrorist state committing genocide against the Palestine people whose land it occupies. The British government's support for arming Israel and supporting it as an 'ally' must be ended. Britain must support Iran in exercising its right to self-defence and demand that Israel cease its attack on Iran and ends its genocide against the Palestinian people." To the US, Britain and their allies the working class and people say "Hands Off Iran!" "Hands Off the Middle East!" "Free Palestine!".
Condemn British Sanctions on Iran
The British government announced on February 2 a new wave of sanctions against several high-ranking Iranian officials and entities accused of involvement in serious human rights violations. This move, the Foreign Office said, "targets individuals within the country's judiciary, security forces and transport infrastructure who have been instrumental in enforcing repressive laws and stifling dissent." The government claims that "these individuals have played a direct role in the suppression of fundamental freedoms and the mistreatment of citizens exercising their right to protest."
These sanctions amount to a declaration of war against a sovereign government. They can be seen as a form of collective punishment that itself violates principles of international justice. The Iranian people are the force that will sort out their own problems. The sanctions are incompatible with the fundamental right of the Iranian people to chart their own future free from external interference. The sanctions go against the Iranian people's ability to determine their own political and economic path. The Iranian nation's right to self-governance must be respected without foreign pressure designed to shape internal affairs.
The Iranian people have the right to determine their own future without British and/or US coercion. Britain must not join with Trump and the US in finding pretexts, whether as regards to Iran's nuclear programme or concern over "perpetrators of human rights violations", with which to commit aggression against Iran, itself a powerful anti-imperialist force.
Notes
1. UK announces sanctions against perpetrators of human rights violations in
Iran
https://www.gov.uk/government/news/uk-announces-sanctions-against-perpetrators-of-human-rights-violations-in-iran
2. Iran Volume 780: debated on Tuesday 3 February 2026
https://hansard.parliament.uk/commons/2026-02-03/debates/9CF7A5A9-1F44-44AD-917F-15F55C597CE6/Iran