Black Agenda Report
Black Agenda Report
News, commentary and analysis from the black left.

  • Home
  • Africa
  • African America
  • Education
  • Environment
  • International
  • Media and Culture
  • Political Economy
  • Radio
  • US Politics
  • War and Empire

Obama Provoking War with Iran
18 Jan 2012
🖨️ Print Article

 

A Black Agenda Radio commentary by Glen Ford

The Obama administration is, arguably, already at war with Iran by most legal and civilized standards – a war of economic strangulation and covert aggression. African Americans have historically opposed U.S. wars against the developing world, but Obama has “blurred the lines between war and not-war,” claiming that his 7-month bombing campaign against Libya was not really a war. Meanwhile, the corporate media “is full of fake news about Iranian threats, when it is the Americans who are doing all the threatening, all the killing.”

 

Obama Provoking War with Iran

A Black Agenda Radio commentary by Glen Ford

“Obama has been as methodical in his buildup to war with Iran as George Bush was with Iraq almost nine years ago.”

A member of the Council on Foreign Relations, which represents the views of the American corporate establishment, says “The probability of armed conflict between the United States and Iran is higher now than at any point since 1988.” That’s because the Obama administration has methodically steered the U.S. military juggernaut towards war with Iran since the day Obama entered the White House. Washington is busily organizing a world economic war against Iran, bullying other countries, and even pressuring the Chinese – so far, unsuccessfully – to boycott Iranian oil, which is an act of war. The U.S. and its allies are hell bent on regime change in Syria, Iran’s neighbor and ally, covertly supporting armed insurgents that have killed more than 1,500 Syrian soldiers and police, while western corporate media blow the bugles of armed intervention. U.S. warships commit daily provocations in the Persian Gulf, hoping to create a pretext for a shooting war. And, just this month, another Iranian scientist was assassinated, either by the Israelis or the CIA, the fifth such murder in the last two years. Such targeted aggressions would be considered acts of war if the Iranians committed them against the US. or Israel.

Iranians know what can happen when the U.S. Navy maneuvers in the Gulf. In 1988, an American missile cruiser shot down an Iranian civilian passenger airliner over the Gulf, killing all 290 people aboard. It was a crime against humanity – and the Iranians remember it well, even if the self-contained American public, does not. The American media, addicted to lying in the service of the U.S. State Department, is full of fake news about Iranian threats, when it is the Americans who are doing all the threatening, all the killing, and subjecting Iran to economic strangulation. Cuba’s Fidel Castro is correct in his assessment that world peace is hanging by a thread.

“Wars, once set in motion, have momentums of their own.”

President Obama has blurred the lines between war and not-war. No sane person could deny that the United States and its NATO allies were at war with Libya during seven months of non-stop bombing, until they finally achieved regime change. But President Obama defied U.S. law and the U.S. Congress, denying that a state of war ever existed. He will doubtless make the same claim when and if he attacks Iran with bombs and missiles. This is a lawless government.

Obama has been as methodical in his buildup to war with Iran as George Bush was with Iraq almost nine years ago, moving step by step to the brink. He might want to avoid pushing gasoline prices to six or eight dollars in an election year, but wars, once set in motion, have momentums of their own.

In February of 2003, only weeks before George Bush invaded Iraq, the Zogby polling agency asked the question: “Would you support or oppose a war against Iraq if it mean thousands of Iraqi civilian casualties?” A large majority of white males and more than a third of white females said, “Yes,” go ahead with the invasion. Only 7 percent of Blacks favored an invasion that would kill thousands of Iraqi civilians. Today, with a Black commander-in-chief, I would hope that African Americans would be just as solidly against a full-blown war against Iran. Very soon, that question may rendered moot by the relentless warmongering of our First Black President.

For Black Agenda Radio, I'm Glen Ford. On the web, go to BlackAgendaReport.com.

BAR executive editor Glen Ford can be contacted at Glen.Ford@BlackAgendaReport.com.



Your browser does not support the audio element.

listen
http://traffic.libsyn.com/blackagendareport/20120118_gf_WarIran.mp3

More Stories


  • Margaret Kimberley, BAR Executive Editor and Senior Columnist
    Donald Trump and the Truth About Robert Mueller
    25 Mar 2026
    Donald Trump is not lying about Robert Mueller. Mueller was the point man for a plot involving the Democratic Party establishment, intelligence agencies, and corporate media. Russiagate was a…
  • Editors, The Black Agenda Review
    ESSAY: Black Folks and Foreign Policy, June Jordan, 1983.
    25 Mar 2026
    “Who will we become if we remain the silent partners to this white arrogance?”
  • Ann Garrison, BAR Contributing Editor , Dan Kovalik
    U.S. Takes Aim at President Gustavo Petro, but He's Akin to a Rock Star in Colombia
    25 Mar 2026
    Ann Garrison, BAR Contributing Editor, spoke to attorney and author Dan Kovalik, President Petro’s legal representative in the US and in international courts. 
  • Raymond Nat Turner, BAR poet-in-residence
    War Crime Cafe
    25 Mar 2026
    "War Crime Cafe" is the latest from BAR's Poet-in-Residence.
  • Anthony Karefa Rogers-Wright
    Big Green + Big Tech = Bigger Environmental Racism: How Certain white-led “environmental” Groups are Selling out Frontline Communities to Accommodate Data Centers
    25 Mar 2026
    Big Green groups taking millions from Big Tech have abandoned vulnerable communities to become accomplices in data center proliferation rather than opponents.
  • Load More
Subscribe
connect with us
about us
contact us