Yossi Schwartz ISL (RCIT section in Israel/Occupied Palestine) 22.01.2026
According to Haaretz: “administration sources told the Wall Street Journal that Trump repeatedly used the word “decisive” when talking about U.S. action in Iran, and its desired impact on the country. The wording of his remarks encouraged advisers at the Pentagon and the White House to present the president with a number of options for action, including those aimed at toppling the Iranian regime. It was also reported that the administration is developing more modest options, including attacking Revolutionary Guards facilities.”
According to the Wall Street Journal, Trump has not yet ordered attacks on Iran, and it is not yet clear how he will ultimately decide. However, the ongoing discussions indicate that the president does not rule out an attack on Iran.
Former administration officials and experts told the Wall Street Journal that the Trump administration’s bigger question is whether it is possible to overthrow a regime in another country using U.S. air power alone. The White House also has to deal with the question of whether it is willing to conduct a long military campaign that could last weeks or months if the protesters in Iran return to the streets and turn to the president to help them.
The White House’s discussions on an attack on Iran are taking place alongside the dispatch of U.S. F-15 fighter jets and the aircraft carrier Abraham Lincoln to the Middle East. The aircraft carrier also includes an attack group that includes destroyers, F-35 fighter jets, additional fighter jets, and aircraft with electronic warfare capabilities. Administration officials told the Wall Street Journal that the region will also have additional air defense systems, including more Patriot and Thaad batteries, which will be essential to deter any Iranian counterattack.
Iran’s Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi warned today that his country would respond with all means at its disposal if attacked again. Arakchi made the threat in an op-ed published in the Wall Street Journal. In the article, he noted the protests that broke out in Iran, claimed that “the violent phase of unrest lasted less than 72 hours,” and repeatedly blamed armed protesters for the violence. Contrary to the restraint shown by Iran in June 2025, our strong-armed forces will not hesitate to return fire with everything we have if we withstand a renewed attack,” Araghchi wrote about his country’s 12-day war with Israel in June. “This is not a warning, but a reality that I feel the need to convey explicitly, because as a diplomat and a veteran, I abhor war.”
The Iranian foreign minister added, “An all-out confrontation will undoubtedly be extremely violent and will last for a long time, much longer than the imaginary timetables that Israel and its proxies are trying to sell to the White House. It will certainly spill over into the entire region and affect ordinary citizens around the world.”
Iran’s parliament’s National Security Committee said yesterday that any attack on Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei would result in a declaration of jihad, the Iranian news agency ISNA reported.
Trump responded to the threats made against him in Iran last night in an interview with the News Nation network. “If something happens, the whole country will explode. They will be wiped off the face of the earth,” he said
Unlike right -wing centrists like the CWI who ignore the imperialist threat to Iran and the counter revolutionaries’ monarchists and only say: “The Iranian workers’ movement to set its own agenda,”. Or the RCI that said the days of the Iranian regime are numbered, Revolutionary Marxists say: If American imperialism does indeed attack Iran, the revolutionary position is a revolutionary defense of Iran and a revolutionary defeat of American imperialism. The working class must already be mobilized and armed. After the defeat of imperialism, as it did in Afghanistan, which is weaker than Iran, the armed working class will overthrow the regime in favor of a democratic revolution that will continue uninterrupted until the revolution of the working-class supported by the poor peasants and the poor in the cities.