Workers World Special Edition
April 25 – The first and most important aspect of the so-called rescue operation in Iran was the complete disregard by the White House and the military of the most elementary democratic rights of the American people, at least as represented in a purely formal way by constitutional provision.
The War Powers Act makes it explicit and mandatory for the president to inform Congress or at least the key committee people from the Senate and the House. Not only was this flagrantly disregarded but even the State Department was not informed, except for Secretary of State Cyrus Vance and his Deputy Secretary of State, Warren Christopher.
Secrecy is not the issue. It’s a mask calculated to shift power more and more into the hands of the military, with the White House actions as its principal accomplice. Both Senators Church and Javits knew that something was already in the wind when they hurriedly sent a letter to the State Department and to the president demanding to be informed.
But the reason why they were not informed was precisely because of the dangerous character of this adventure, which is the product of unbridled rampant militarism working in collusion with precisely those industrialists and bankers who have the greatest stake in such a dangerous development, particularly the oil barons and the largest oil conglomerates like Exxon and the others.
Nothing can possibly surpass the cynicism with which this adventure was put over in light of the fact that it endangered the lives of the hostages rather than tended to free them in safely. The military needed this maneuver. They have long boasted that they’re “ahead of the Russians” in experience, with two wars – Korea and Viet Nam – where helicopters were widely used.
They’ve often boasted that desert warfare is not a great obstacle in light of the terrain in parts of the U.S. The helicopter manufacturers, like Bell, Sikorsky, and others, can scarcely hide their interest in this venture.
But viewed in any light, from the military point of view it was needed as a dress rehearsal for the war which they are and have been preparing all along. It was also needed by the entire military-industrial complex as a demonstration of the alleged continued supremacy of American technology and its high sophistication, particularly in its military application.
It was meant to demonstrate that high technology can vanquish an oppressed people fighting a revolutionary war of national liberation. It was meant to help overcome the defeat administered by the Vietnamese people against the aggression of the carnivorous multinational corporations in alliance with the military. As Kissinger said, “It was aimed to show the Soviets that we are serious.”
The issue is not whether it really succeeded. The issue is the direction of events as projected and manipulated by the Pentagon and the White House. But they are not omnipotent. The military is straining at the leash to show what they can do. And an all-too willing White House, with its eyes riveted on the election, could only be accommodating.
Yet there is a war within the capitalist establishment that has its importance nevertheless. The most illuminating aspect of this inner war in the imperialist establishment was shown when the Pentagon, after hours of waiting, finally was to present its version of the collapse of the adventure.
Seasoned observers, who watch for where the influence of the military vis-à-vis the civilian government is going, got an object lesson when the Pentagon finally lifted the curtain and presented Secretary of Defense Harold Brown to explain away the disaster. The question that any seasoned observer would ask is: Why did Brown have to do the explaining away?
All the questions that he deemed necessary to answer were not questions for a civilian secretary of defense to answer. They were technical, logistical questions that were strictly within the purview of the Joint Chiefs of Staff of the military.
The secretary of defense is to supervise the military and to explain to the general public the broader aspects. Instead, he concentrated on the technical matters which were strictly for Joint Chiefs Chairman [David C.] Jones, who was right beside him and merely answered one innocuous question.
Why this set-up? The answer, of course, is that the military is not going to make itself available to the public to explain a military disaster. Rather, they put up the technician-scientist Brown, who seemed as nervous as a hen in fielding questions in matters that were not for him but were truly for a subordinate.
This is the way the military wants it. This is what the union of militarism and the most powerful banking and industrial monopolies have brought this country to and where it is heading – straight to an enlarged war.
Although revolutionary Marxist-Leninists firmly believe in the inevitability of imperialist wars, fatalism in the struggle against imperialist war is totally alien to the very spirit and revolutionary essence of Marxism-Leninism.
This made adventure, which is the first phase in a cruel and despicable predatory war, is opening the eyes of the people, not only in the United States, but all over the world.
Last updated: 11 May 2026