The Iran War Debate

Or, who’s for regime change?

The PM’s seat was empty in House of Commons’ during the marathon, four-hour debate on the Iran War on the evening of March 9. ^[1] The Foreign Minister, Anita Ananda, got the first chance at the hot seat instead, to try to defend the government’s inconsistencies in its approach to the US and Israeli attack on Iran. Anand did her best with a weak hand, suggesting the core principle at stake for the Liberals was to ensure that Iran never acquired nuclear weapons and stopped acting as a terrorist agent of disruption in the region and the world.

The Defence Minister, David McGuinty, also got his time on the hot seat. He spoke to emphasize the need for de-escalation of the Iran War, without even sketching a starting point or a plan. He also suggested an optimistic outlook for the Iran war, arguing that the weakening of a repressive regime would open the door to a better future. Note weakening, not all-out regime change. But is that door truly being opened? The immediate prospects seem very remote, not least as signalled by the ascendancy of Ali Khameini’s equally hardline son, Mojtaba, to the leadership of Iran and the regime’s defiant rejection of an American demand for “unconditional” surrender.

The Conservative Party leader, Pierre Poilievre, made his own position on the war clear. He fully and unequivocally supports the US-Israeli war against Iran because he believes in the necessity of regime change and believes that bringing democracy forward in Iran can only happen if the current hard-line establishment is removed—he didn’t say ‘decapitated.’ This position is sustainable, of course, only if the war aims of the US and Israel are actually devoted to bringing about real regime change in Iran. The Conservatives seem unwilling to entertain any doubts on that point, especially Shuvaloy (“Shuv”) Majumdar, the Conservative MP for Calgary/Heritage whose stated belief in the ability of Iranians to rise up and seize a historic moment echoed remarks made at the very outset of the war by the US President.

Hope for regime change in Iran hovers over the positions of the two key parties, albeit in different ways. Only what is left of the NDP, represented in the debate by interim leader Don Davies, completely condemns the war as illegal and rejects the hope that democratic regime change can emerge from it.

Who can deny that the hope of regime change in Iran is estimable, is aching. The reality? As we enter the second week of a war of uncertain duration, even to its chief architect, the US President, the only certainty is that Israel and the United States want to destroy the military power of Iran, kill the political, military and security force leadership of Iran, and deploy overwhelming force to achieve these aims.

Can they win the war—undoubtedly. Can they win the peace? Does their vision of peace mean a new democratic regime in Tehran, or just a new and subservient regime?

There is no real indication that Israel and the United States are devoted to democratic regime change in Iran or have any plan to make it happen. Building a capable democratic regime out of a landscape of ruin rained from above, is even less likely than building a capable democratic regime, without consistent international support and years of political development, from the entrails of a theocratic/military dictatorship that has been in power for 47 years.

There is one MP in the House, the sole surviving representative of the Green Party, Elizabeth May, who rejects what she sees as the false choice between embracing regime change through an illegal war, or abandoning the Iranian people. May fervently believes that the US-Israeli war against Iran must be condemned as illegal, and replaced by a return to diplomacy, while hoping that the aspirations of the Iranian people for a better life can be achieved. That principled path is, in the present construction of Canadian politics, a lonely one and seemingly the furthest from the designs of the belligerents.

---

^[1] The debate can be viewed on the Parliamentary website at: https://parlvu.parl.gc.ca/Harmony/en/PowerBrowser/PowerBrowserV2/20260309/-1/44529?Language=English&Stream=Video It commences at 6:31 pm and concludes at 10:27 p.m. Marathon alert!