The Revolutionary Spirit of Iran (w/ Behrooz Ghamari) | The Chris Hedges Report

The United States, in its recent war on Iran, has completely misread the Iranian people and failed to recognize the deep revolutionary spirit that pervades Iranian culture. Rather than inciting Iranian people against their government, the US-Israeli war on Iran has united the population. Rather than promoting democracy in Iran and empowering the people, US economic punishment and aggression have accomplished the opposite and have made life more difficult for most Iranians. Like Cuba, Iran is being targeted because it will not relinquish its sovereignty. As Chris Hedges explains, Iran is being punished for “its refusal to become a client state aligned with American interests in the region.”

In this episode, Hedges speaks with Professor Behrooz Ghamari-Tabrizi, the author of “The Long War on Iran: New Events, Old Questions” (OR Books, January 2026). Ghamari is currently a visiting scholar at the Center for Place, Culture and Politics at the CUNY Graduate Center in New York. In his book, Ghamari tackles the myths perpetuated by the United States to demonize Iran in order to justify the imposition of severe sanctions and to go to war on Iran twice in less than one year. He discusses the many reasons why the Islamic Republic does not trust the United States to negotiate in good faith.

Year zero in the current struggle, Ghamari explains, was 1953 when the United States and the United Kingdom conducted a successful coup of the democratically elected Prime Minister Mohammad Mossadegh. This led to the Iranian Revolution in 1979, described by Ghamari as “the largest, most populous revolution in world history [that] defeated the fifth largest military in the world at the time.” Following that, events such as the Eight Year War, in which the United States provided the tools for chemical warfare on Iranians by Iraq, and the betrayal of Iran by President Bush, calling it part of the Axis of Evil despite Iran playing an instrumental role with the US in defeating the Taliban in Afghanistan, have created the conditions for “ the transfer of collective revolutionary consciousness generation after generation.”

Ghamari discusses Iran’s support for the Axis of Resistance as a way to create a “Ring of Fire” around it, opportunities to struggle against US and Israeli imperialism outside of Iran’s borders with the hope of avoiding a war at home. He states that initially Iranians opposed the use of resources to support Palestinians, Hezbollah and the defense of Syria, but now they understand the utility. Iranians see themselves in these struggles, and that is why a popular movement has taken the streets night after night against US attacks.

The outcome of the current conflict is uncertain, but Ghamari theorizes, and Hedges agrees, that Iran has a strong hand to play and the best result would be a return to a lifting of the economic sanctions in return for limits on Iran’s nuclear enrichment efforts, as was agreed in the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action in 2015. The wildcards are the United States and Israel, who may be unwilling to compromise and may resort to dropping nuclear bombs in desperation.