Version imprimableOver Iranian territory, the smell of gunpowder and blood hangs in the air. No fragrance of freedom, no scent of dawn. Only the stench of munitions depots that, at the first spark, would bring down the roofs of houses — never those of the palaces of power.
The scene repeats itself, relentless: threats from Washington, adventurism from Tehran, the war machine in Tel Aviv, and the clamour of monarchist and ethnicist circles. Each speaks its own language, but the message is universal: it is Iranian society that will pay in blood.
Donald Trump, in his swaggering tone, had been warning for days: "grave consequences will befall Iran" if no agreement is reached. The United States declared itself ready for military intervention against what it considers an imminent threat. Military officials confirmed: the army is "ready for all scenarios." In military language, this is not merely a state of alert — it is the shadow of catastrophe looming overhead.
On the other side, the late Ali Khamenei, [2] with an obstinacy bordering on political criminality, had for years been plunging the country into repression, sanctions, poverty and isolation. In so doing, he then pushed the nation towards a devastating war, using the climate of fear to smother all social and political contestation.
Between these two poles of danger, Benjamin Netanyahu lay in wait, at the head of a war machine ready to strike, while a section of the right-wing opposition, eyes gleaming, transformed the possible roar of explosions into an illusion of freedom.
This is the tacit alliance of reactionary forces: a conglomerate whose profits feed the powerful, and whose price is paid in the blood of the people.
When War Strikes, Everything Breaks
War is not merely an explosion. It is the progressive collapse of life. A worker who, tomorrow, will have no factory. A mother hesitating between the queue for bread and the queue for medicine. A child memorising the wail of air-raid sirens instead of the school bell. A city whose nights are lit by the flashes of anti-aircraft fire, never by the light of hearths.
In strategic inner circles, people speak of "military options" without ever smelling the overcrowded hospitals. They ignore the fact that entire generations will live for years with trauma, poverty and an absence of horizons.
War, even a brief one, leaves lasting scars. When it takes root, it fractures society from within.
The Bloody History of the Region
No prophecy is needed to understand --- one only has to look around. In Iraq, people spoke of "surgical strikes": society was dismembered. In Libya, "protecting the people" did not prevent the collapse of the state. In Syria, the "opportunity for change" buried generations under rubble.
Everywhere the war machine of the ruling classes has intervened, it is the infrastructures of life that have been destroyed: the working class dispersed, social movements smothered, new reactionary forces promoted. Such is the unwritten law of contemporary wars. [3]
Dark Scenario: Iran on the Edge of the Downward Spiral
The danger currently exceeds a few isolated strikes. Iran has entered a destructive spiral that could rapidly plunge the society into a situation comparable to Syria’s. [4]
Today, the exhausted economy, deep social discontent, the water crisis, and mass unemployment render Iranian society extremely vulnerable in the face of regional conflict.
In these conditions, war could:
— - Precipitate the economic collapse into freefall;
— - Accelerate the militarisation of society;
— - Inflame ethnic and regional fractures;
— - Plunge daily life under the grip of Islamist terrorist movements, Persian supremacists, and other ethnicist forces;
— - And above all, crush the people’s struggle for freedom under the weight of securitarianism.
At that point, the question will no longer be who holds power, but what remains alive within society.
Walking on the People’s Blood
Among the darkest scenes: certain factions of the right-wing opposition are beating the war drum rather than alerting the population. Aware that they have no role to play in overthrowing the regime from below, these actors are betting on a regime change imposed from above.
Iranian society is not a military testing ground. Every missile first pierces the life of the people. Every tightened sanction first reduces the bread on the worker’s table. And every war launched casts mourning over the mothers of this land.
How many more times must this people pay? How many more generations will be buried beneath the rubble of "geopolitical necessities"? How many more times must they mistake freedom for the howl of sirens?
Humanist Resistance Against Planned Death
Faced with this clamour for war, one must assert, without hesitation, a profoundly humanist position: [5]
— - No to the murderous enterprises of Islamism and the regime’s "leadership";
— - No to Donald Trump’s policy of military intimidation;
— - No to Israel’s military adventurism;
— - No to the dangerous and criminal gambles of the monarchists and ethnicist forces.
The Iranian people are neither the fuel for a war, nor a pawn on the chessboard of negotiations. Freedom, if it is to be real, will emerge neither from a cannon, nor from a missile, nor from Trump declaring "We are ready [to support you]."
Freedom springs only from the heart of a society that survives, organises, and takes its destiny into its own hands. All of this demands great sacrifice.
2 March 2026
Translated and notes by Mark Johnson for ESSF from ESSF in French.
