Analysis of: ‘We didn’t start this war but under president Trump, we’re finishing it,’ says Pete Hegseth – US politics live
The Guardian | March 2, 2026
TL;DR
The US launches war on Iran without congressional authorization, revealing how imperial state power operates beyond democratic constraints when capital's geopolitical interests demand it. Democrats' feeble response exposes the bipartisan consensus on American empire despite constitutional theater.
Analytical Focus:Contradictions Historical Context Class Analysis
The US military campaign against Iran, dubbed 'Operation Epic Fury,' represents a crystallization of contradictions within American capitalist democracy. The executive branch has launched a major war—including the assassination of Iran's supreme leader and ongoing bombing campaigns—while Congress debates whether it has the authority to restrain actions already underway. This reveals the fundamental contradiction between formal democratic procedures and the actual functioning of imperial state power: when capital's geopolitical interests require military action, constitutional niceties become performative obstacles rather than genuine constraints. The framing deployed by Defense Secretary Hegseth exemplifies how imperial violence is ideologically laundered through defensive rhetoric. His claim that 'we didn't start this war' inverts historical reality—the US has maintained crippling sanctions on Iran, withdrew from the nuclear agreement, and has surrounded the country with military bases for decades. The 47-year timeframe Hegseth invokes conveniently begins with the 1979 revolution that overthrew a US-backed dictator, erasing the prior history of American intervention including the 1953 CIA coup. This selective memory serves to naturalize American aggression as perpetual self-defense. The Democratic response illustrates how the two-party system functions as a single capitalist party with two wings. While some Democrats perform opposition through war powers resolutions, figures like Senator Fetterman openly celebrate the assassination and promise to block any meaningful restraint. The constitutional debate becomes spectacle—Congress will likely fail to limit executive war powers, as it has consistently failed throughout the post-WWII imperial era. The material reality is that both parties represent fractions of capital that share fundamental interests in maintaining American hegemony, particularly over energy-rich regions crucial to the global oil trade that underpins dollar supremacy.
Class Dynamics
Actors: US executive branch/military command, Congressional representatives (both parties), Defense/military industrial contractors, US service members, Iranian civilian population, Iranian state leadership, Israeli state apparatus, Oil/energy capital interests
Beneficiaries: Military-industrial corporations receiving weapons contracts, Energy sector capital benefiting from regional instability and potential resource access, Israeli capital and state interests in regional dominance, Political figures building 'strong on defense' credentials
Harmed Parties: Iranian civilian population facing bombing campaigns, US service members killed in action, American working class bearing war costs through taxes and potential blowback, Global working class facing economic instability from conflict
The executive branch has effectively seized war-making power from Congress despite constitutional provisions, demonstrating how the capitalist state concentrates authority in its most insulated branches when pursuing imperial objectives. Congressional 'debate' functions as democratic theater while actual decisions remain with military command and executive leadership serving concentrated capital interests. The bipartisan nature of imperial consensus—with centrist Democrats breaking ranks to support the war—reveals how class interests transcend party affiliation.
Material Conditions
Economic Factors: Control over Middle Eastern oil reserves and shipping lanes, Maintenance of dollar hegemony through petrodollar system, Defense industry profit from weapons expenditure, Potential reconstruction contracts in post-war scenario, Global market instability affecting commodity prices
The war represents the violent dimension of maintaining global production relations favorable to American capital. Iran's resistance to US-dominated international financial systems and its oil resources outside Western control threatens the architecture of global accumulation. Military action serves to discipline states that refuse integration into US-led capitalist order, ensuring continued access to cheap resources and labor across the Global South.
Resources at Stake: Iranian oil and gas reserves, Strategic control of Persian Gulf shipping, Regional military basing rights, Dollar's role as global reserve currency, Israeli regional hegemony
Historical Context
Precedents: 1953 CIA coup overthrowing Mossadegh, Iraq War launched without genuine congressional authorization, Libya intervention exceeding UN mandate, Consistent post-WWII pattern of executive war-making, Obama drone campaigns without congressional approval
This action continues the post-WWII pattern of American imperial expansion operating through a permanent national security state largely independent of democratic oversight. The War Powers Act of 1973, passed after Vietnam, has proven consistently ineffective at restraining executive military action. Each administration expands precedents for unilateral war-making, creating an imperial presidency that functions as the command center for global capital's enforcement arm. The targeting of Iran specifically continues decades of US policy aimed at controlling Middle Eastern energy resources and maintaining regional allies like Israel and Saudi Arabia.
Contradictions
Primary: The fundamental contradiction between formal democratic governance and the actual functioning of imperial state power. The Constitution grants Congress war-making authority, yet the executive consistently launches wars while Congress debates powerlessly—revealing democracy as form rather than substance when core imperial interests are at stake.
Secondary: The contradiction between rhetoric of 'finishing' a war and the reality of initiating major escalation, Democrats' contradiction between opposing executive overreach and supporting the underlying imperial project, The contradiction between 'surgical' strikes rhetoric and the reality of regime change warfare, The contradiction between serving 'the people' and serving capital's geopolitical interests
These contradictions are unlikely to resolve through constitutional mechanisms. War powers resolutions will likely fail or prove unenforceable. The more probable trajectory is continued concentration of war-making authority in the executive, with occasional performative opposition. Resolution would require either fundamental transformation of the state apparatus or a material crisis (military defeat, economic collapse) that forces restructuring. The immediate trajectory points toward expanded conflict with uncertain regional consequences.
Global Interconnections
This military campaign must be understood within the context of declining American hegemony and intensifying inter-imperial rivalry. As China rises and the BRICS bloc offers alternative international financial architecture, the US faces pressure to maintain dominance through force where economic leverage weakens. Iran's alignment with Russia and China, its oil sales outside the dollar system, and its support for regional forces resisting Israeli expansion all threaten American strategic position. The action also connects to the broader pattern of neoliberal governance, where elected legislatures are systematically bypassed on matters of economic and military policy. Just as trade agreements and central bank policies operate beyond democratic reach, war-making has been effectively transferred to unaccountable executive authority. This represents the maturation of what some theorists call 'authoritarian neoliberalism'—maintaining formal democratic structures while hollowing out their substantive power over decisions affecting capital accumulation and imperial maintenance.
Conclusion
The Iran war reveals with unusual clarity how the capitalist state functions as an instrument of class rule, particularly in its imperial dimensions. For working people, the immediate implications include the human cost of combat, economic instability, and the diversion of resources from social needs to military destruction. More fundamentally, this moment exposes the limits of reformist strategies that seek change through existing constitutional channels—when imperial interests demand action, those channels prove hollow. Building genuine opposition to imperial war requires organizing outside and against the bipartisan war consensus, connecting anti-war politics to the material interests of working people who bear war's costs while capital reaps its benefits.
Suggested Reading
- Imperialism, the Highest Stage of Capitalism by V.I. Lenin (1917) Lenin's analysis of how advanced capitalism necessarily produces imperial expansion and military competition remains essential for understanding why the US must project force to maintain its position in the global system.
- The State and Revolution by V.I. Lenin (1917) Lenin's examination of how the capitalist state concentrates power in its executive and military apparatus, bypassing democratic forms when class interests require it, directly illuminates the war powers dynamics on display.
- The Shock Doctrine by Naomi Klein (2007) Klein's documentation of how crises—including wars—serve to advance capital's interests while democracy is suspended provides a framework for understanding potential post-war 'reconstruction' agendas.
- Blackshirts and Reds by Michael Parenti (1997) Parenti's analysis of how liberal democracies pursue imperial objectives while maintaining democratic facades helps explain the bipartisan consensus enabling this war despite constitutional theater.