Why U.S. Imperialism and Its CIA Target Iran

– Pauline Easton –

Calgary, June 20, 2025

The U.S. rulers and their Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) were behind the 1953 overthrow of the pro-nation building government of Mohammad Mosaddegh in Iran and the coup d'état which installed the blood-thirsty regime of Shah Pahlavi. The Shah's regime committed heinous crimes against the Iranian people for more than a quarter of a century. Its overthrow was long-awaited by the people, not only in Iran but worldwide.

The people of Iran waged heroic struggles to end the Shah's regime and U.S. dictate, sacrificing many martyrs who faced the dungeons of the Shah, torture, and their execution at the hands of the Shah's infamous political police SAVAK, which itself was organized and set in motion by the CIA and Mossad. The Iranian people rose up in a courageous revolution in 1979 which overthrew the Shah. The revolution led to the establishment of the Islamic Republic of Iran which overthrew the tutelage of the Anglo-American imperialists -- an act for which they have never forgiven Iran.

Both Iran and Israel were U.S. imperialism's counterrevolutionary bases in the region called the Middle East. A serious problem for them was that neither the apartheid Zionist state of Israel nor Persian Iran are Arab. In order to realize its hegemonic designs over the entire Middle East and sabotage the peoples' struggles, this impelled the U.S. to use its CIA to create, fund and arm counterrevolutionary organizations in the Arab countries. Then, using the pretext that they were Islamic fundamentalist terrorist groups, the U.S. would intervene in the name of opposing "terrorism."

Similarly, since the Shah was overthrown in 1979, the Anglo-American imperialists have used the justification that they are fighting Islamic terrorism to sabotage the Islamic Republic of Iran in myriad ways. The CIA and U.S. military have played a main role in efforts to engineer counterrevolution and secure regime change in Iran as well as in the entire region. Much of it has been done in the name of countering the "terrorism threat" the U.S. created, and claiming that this threat it is posed by Islamic fundamentalism.

U.S. efforts failed in both Iraq and Afghanistan and continue to fail in Iran.

This agenda of regime change was addressed by James Woolsey, who was CIA director when the coup was organized against Iran in 1953. He testified before the Senate Intelligence Committee on January 10, 1995, in Washington, DC. After praising the CIA for its subversive activities in Iran, in a provocative manner he arrogantly branded Iran as the "long term elusive problem" facing U.S. imperialism and described the proliferation of nuclear weapons as the "leading intelligence concern" of U.S. imperialism.

Woolsey demanded that the sabotage of Iran constantly deserves top attention "because of its role in connection with international terrorism and because of its role as a potential weapons-proliferating state."

Woolsey targeted Iran because he mistakenly thought that its militant adherence to Islamic fundamentalism and thought material made it an easy target. The 30 years since his testimony have shown that Woolsey and U.S. imperialism were gravely mistaken in thinking they could fool public opinion and turn it against Iran in this way.

It is known that the U.S. ensures Israel has nuclear weapons, while claiming Iran cannot have them. Whenever the U.S. has threatened Iran, the anti-war movement everywhere takes the stand, Hands Off! and says, remember Iraq and the lie of "weapons of mass destruction." The same was true most recently after Trump bombed Iran and there were immediate actions rejecting war against Iran, which assisted Iran's ability to block U.S./Zionist efforts and stop the U.S. and Israel after 12 days.

Even though public opinion is opposed to war on Iran, following the course set by the U.S. in 1995, the 2025 G7 Leaders' Summit held in June in Kananaskis, Alberta issued a statement which said that Iran is the source of instability and "terror" in the Middle East. This was said at a time the entire world directly witnessed the U.S. and Israeli bombing of Iran's nuclear facilities, not to mention that not a word was said about the continuing criminal U.S./Zionist genocide on the people of Gaza.

Continuing U.S. aggression and interference against Iran and worldwide shows that the "rules-based international order" of the Anglo-American imperialists and their Genocide 7 and NATO partners, including Canada, is failing to provide a way out of their crises. They think repeating their old Cold War dogmas about external threats -- then targeting communism, today "terrorism" and Islamic fundamentalism -- will hide the very undemocratic, anti-social, pro-war direction of their countries. This is generating great anger and resistance among the people.

However, it is also the case that their repetition of Cold War dogmas, to spread doubt about the just cause of the peoples the U.S. targets, creates a dangerous situation for the peoples of the world. This underscores the necessity to smash all prejudices spread by the Anglo-American imperialists when it comes to the peoples of the world and what they stand for.

These prejudices and dogmas are spread for purposes of justifying the interference of the big powers in the internal affairs of sovereign countries. These big powers dictate how these countries must establish their reasons of state, state structures and elect governments in a manner such that they are subordinate to foreign interests, especially those of the U.S. It must not pass.

Montreal June 21, 2025

Trump Talk of Obliterating Iran of Serious Concern

Following the U.S. bombing of Iran's nuclear facilities, Trump spoke of these facilities being "completely and totally obliterated." He continues to use the term in a manner meant to be taken more generally, that the U.S. can and will obliterate an entire people. That Trump as U.S. president, having bombed Iran, is now speaking about obliterating a people is of serious concern.

Trump is a recognized uncouth gangster but his raising of this notion of obliteration cannot be dismissed or ignored. It should be remembered that Hillary Clinton, in her 2008 campaign against Obama, also said the U.S. could "totally obliterate" Iran and she would do so if Iran attacked Israel.

To obliterate refers to wiping out life itself. It wipes out the right to be. When someone can use their positions of power to say they can obliterate you, then any criteria that show human solidarity and human beings with traits which express their humanity, are to be eliminated. They can obliterate a people.

Obliteration is a crime beyond genocide. It indicates that the world has reached a stage way beyond where fascism was supposed to be the highest order of depravity.

The fact is U.S. imperialism is the greatest source of aggressive war, the greatest terrorist and sponsor of international terrorism, the greatest trader in weapons and the owner of the world's greatest stockpile of nuclear, chemical, biological and other weapons. It is also the country that not only threatens to use these weapons but actually used them when it dropped atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

For the U.S. to target Iran and talk of obliterating Iran is dangerous and extremely self-serving. Persons accused of being Muslim "terrorists" -- in a style reminiscent of the false Cold War accusations against those who resisted U.S. imperialist control, aggression and war -- are killed every day all over the world to justify the terrorism of the U.S. and its NATO and G7 allies.

In 1995, Woolsey proposed to prepare another aggression against Iran as an extension of this campaign in which Muslims became fair game to be killed, injured, imprisoned, and tortured in various parts of the world.

It is the same modus operandi used by the president of the United States today when immigrants, migrants and refugees are called criminals to justify their kidnapping, detention, incarceration, torture, and deportations.

In Canada, attempts by the political police and spies of the "Five Eyes" (the U.S., Britain, Canada, Australia, and New Zealand) to justify the restructuring of the state by raising the bogey of "foreign interference" in the "democratic processes and institutions," serves the same purpose. Mass police violence, arrests, and deportations of Palestinian supporters in the U.S., Britain and now Canada are also for purposes of disrupting the peoples' movements against genocide and in defence of the rights of all -- for the peoples' right to be, according to their own determination.

Iran's Staunch Stand Against U.S. Imperialism

The main reason U.S. imperialism and its Genocide 7 allies target Iran is that Iran is one of the staunchest fighters against U.S. imperialism. Furthermore, the truth of the matter is that besides revolutionary forces, in which the Marxist-Leninists stand second to none, the Muslims are the main force fighting U.S. imperialism and the other imperialist powers since the end of the Cold War and even before.

It is very important to oppose the broad propaganda and subversive campaigns being conducted by the U.S. imperialists and others, including the government of Canada, against Iran and other Islamic forces referred to as the Axis of Resistance. The imperialist condemnation of all forces fighting for their rights must be vigorously opposed. This includes rejecting the disinformation of the monopoly media and all those who enjoy positions of power and privilege in Canada and the U.S.

U.S. imperialism failed in Iran before, and it will fail again. The working class stands with the people of Iran and other peoples fighting for their dignity, independence and right to self-determination against imperialism and their lackeys.

Like everything else, Muslim fundamentalism also requires modernization, but this task belongs to the Muslims themselves whose thought material long before the European Renaissance recognized the distinction between religious and state affairs. The U.S. and its CIA and intelligence agencies of other imperialist powers have no right to interfere.

Distinguishing who supports the independence and well-being of sovereign peoples is indicative of where a force stands. The U.S., Canada and Genocide 7 pose as the greatest "democrats" and cooperate with one another to subvert and interfere with all movements of the peoples for liberation and the movement of the working class for emancipation. Wherever they have gained the upper hand, tragedies befall the people.

Since WWII and before, these same imperialist powers organized provocateurs and murderers into terrorist bands to paralyze and block people from fighting for their rights. They gave these terrorists a variety of left-sounding names like "Red" or "Marxist." They even called them "Communist," "Marxist-Leninist" and "Maoist." These imperialist forces were behind kidnappings, robberies, murders, and other acts of sabotage, while claiming to be defenders of the people. These criminal actions carried out by these terrorist groups were then blamed on revolutionaries, Muslim fundamentalists and "gangs" -- as is also occurring today.

When the Cold War ended, the world witnessed an increase, not a decrease, in these acts of sabotage by the imperialists and their lackeys carried out in the name of counterterrorism, opposing anti-Semitism, and "defending" freedom and democracy.

The working class must be extremely clear about what is the cutting edge of the anti-imperialist struggle. The working class, as the force favouring fundamental change of society, must not be confused by superficial phenomena and appearances. It must go to the heart of the matter and take the side of all the peoples who are fighting for their rights. The working class, with its internationalist spirit, has a duty to support every struggle for independence and/or democratic rights. It has a duty and social responsibility to stand against every kind of persecution and oppression, use of force to sort out problems, imposition of extreme violence, genocide and now obliteration as the "new normal" -- which ruling classes everywhere hope the peoples of the world are powerless to end and overcome. The working class must do so while waging its own struggle for emancipation, which is the basis for emancipating all of humanity.

At this time, one of the most important struggles the working class must support is the right of peoples to choose their own economic system and their own political system. Peoples have the right to their own culture, their own thought material and their own way of life. The imperialists are demanding that the entire world accept the way of life and dictate of the imperialists, as in their demands to create a Palestinian state in which it is the imperialists and foreign powers who decide who the Palestinians are permitted to choose as leaders and have for government.

The Republic of Cuba is one of the countries which is fighting for the right to choose its own way of life. The Democratic People's Republic of Korea is another. The Islamic Republic of Iran and various countries in Africa amongst others are also fighting for their own ways of life.

Whether or not one likes or even understands the system in a particular country, it is of utmost importance to support the struggle of all countries against imperialism. This does not take away a people's right to define the rights which belong to them by virtue of being human or to consider proposals about changes required in the world or one's own country to create systems which serve humankind.

First, however, the working class must defend the right of all countries and peoples to self-determination.

British-American Coup in Iran Installs Tyranny of Shah Pahlavi

– Dougal MacDonald –

Demonstration in Tehran, July 25, 1953, in support of the Mosaddegh government.

The August 19, 1953 Iranian coup d'état was the overthrow of the democratically elected government of Iranian Prime Minister Mohammad Mosaddegh, orchestrated by the intelligence agencies of the United Kingdom and the United States under the name AJAX Project. The coup centralized all power in U.S.-backed Mohammad Reza Pahlavi, who had already been Shah of Iran (Iran's monarch) since 1941. Shah Pahlavi was in power for 26 years until the people of Iran overthrew him in an uprising in February 1979.

Iran's oil industry had been nationalized in 1951 with near-unanimous support of Iran's parliament in a bill introduced by Prime Minister Mosaddegh. Iran's oil had previously been exclusively in the hands of the British-owned Anglo-Iranian Oil Company. Using "the threat of communism" as well as personal attacks on Mosaddegh as weapons, the British tried vainly to divert attention from the undeniable fact that their real aim was to reclaim their control of Iranian oil.

Iranian workers take over the Anglo-Iranian Oil Company building in Abadan, June 20, 1951, following nationalization of the oil industry and formation of the National Iranian Oil Company.

Despite Mosaddegh's popular support, Britain refused to negotiate concerning Iran's oil, Britain's single most valuable foreign asset. It instead instigated a worldwide boycott of Iranian oil to try to pressure Iran economically. This included blockading the Persian Gulf and the strategic Strait of Hormuz (between the Persian Gulf and the Gulf of Oman). Both Britain and the U.S. then decided to overthrow Iran's government. What was at stake was strategic control of Iran as a means to dominate the surrounding area and control of Iran's oil. After the coup, the U.S. military provided aid, training, and arms to the Shah and the Shah's government granted U.S. and British oil companies the majority of the oil concessions.

A royal decree dismissing Mosaddegh and appointing the Nazi collaborator and U.S.-U.K. puppet General Fazlollah Zahedi as Prime Minister was drawn up by the coup plotters and signed by the Shah. The CIA bribed street thugs, clergy, politicians and Iranian army officers to take part in a propaganda campaign against Mosaddegh and his government. On August 19, 1953, a pro-Shah mob, paid by the CIA's main Iran operative, Kermit Roosevelt, marched on Mosaddegh's residence.

According to the CIA's own declassified documents, some of the most feared mobsters in Tehran were hired by the CIA to stage the pro-Shah riots. Other CIA-paid men were brought into Tehran in buses and trucks and took over the streets. Eight hundred people were killed during and as a direct result of the street conflicts, including Mosaddegh's Chief of Police, Mahmoud Afshartous, who was lured to a fake meeting, tortured, and strangled to death by plotters.

Mosaddegh was arrested, tried, and convicted of treason by the Shah's military court. On December 21, 1953, he was arbitrarily sentenced to three years in jail, then placed under house arrest for the remainder of his life. He died in 1967. Many of Mosaddegh's supporters were rounded up, imprisoned, tortured, and executed.

After behind-the-scenes negotiations, the foreign oil industry was reinstalled as the purchasers and refiners of Iranian oil. But this time the carve-up was significantly different. Instead of the British getting all the oil, their share was reduced to 40 per cent of the new consortium. The five top U.S. oil companies, mainly owned by Rockefeller (Standard Oil of New Jersey, now Exxon Mobil; Socony-Vacuum -- formerly Standard Oil of New York and now Exxon Mobil–Standard Oil of California; Gulf; and Texaco) received another 40 per cent.

U.S. Secretary of State John Foster Dulles, a trustee of the Rockefeller Foundation (whose brother Allen was head of the CIA, newly-formed in 1947), placed a defined upper limit on any participation in the new consortium by smaller independent U.S. oil companies. In addition to rewarding the Rockefeller interests, the CIA's man-on-the-spot directing the operation, Kermit Roosevelt, grandson of former U.S. president Theodore Roosevelt, received his own reward by being appointed a vice president of the Mellon family's Gulf Oil.

The Shah was overthrown in a popular revolt in 1979 and fled to the U.S. under the protection of his long-time patron, David Rockefeller. He died in 1980. During the Shah's rule, the Rockefellers' Chase Manhattan Bank syndicated more than $1.7 billion in loans for his projects. In addition, three of the Rockefellers' Standard Oil companies ended up with a generous total of 24 per cent ownership in the post-Mosaddegh foreign-controlled Iranian Oil Participants Consortium.

Mass action during Iranian revolution, December 11, 1978.

(To access articles individually click on the black headline.)

PDF

PREVIOUS ISSUES | HOME

Website: www.cpcml.ca Email: editor@cpcml.ca