Now that the Trump administration has escalated the threats made to Iran, the usual justifications for war are already circulating, including those that tell us that US intervention in foreign countries is about spreading democracy. We are told that bombing other countries could prevent evil regimes from killing their own people. We are told that we are doing a good thing. All of this is, of course, a lie.
The real purpose of this war was always to expand the imperial machine that is the American state. This war will enrich the political class and the military-industrial complex and that all at the expense of ordinary, hard-working and peaceful people.
The Core Principle of Libertarianism
Libertarianism is built on the simple principle that is the non-aggression principle—no person or group of persons may use force against another peaceful person. This principle applies to natural persons, corporations, and governments equally.
There is much to be said about the Iranian government. The Iranian government aggresses against its own citizens. It is a theocratic regime that brutally violates the rights of its citizens every single day. But the question should not be if the Iranian regime is evil. The question should be if the imperial American state has the (moral) authority to forcefully initiate a regime change. It does not.
The Iranian military had not attacked American soil, not a single Iranian drone had struck an American city, not a single Iranian citizen had attacked the United States, before the first US intervention. The crimes that the brutal regime of Iran commits against its own people, are not crimes against the American people. Therefore, American strikes in Iran are offensive acts, aggressive acts, especially against civilians.
Support for the Intervention
Supporters of US-interventionism will offer a false dilemma they have made countless times. Either we strike Iran, they say, or we abandon the world to tyrants with evil weapons, the isolationist position.
This argument is a straw man. The position of libertarians should be that of the non-interventionist which is distinct from the position of the isolationist.
The isolationist seeks to withdraw entirely from international affairs, including trade and diplomacy. The non-interventionist seeks something completely different. The non-interventionist seeks a peaceful and diplomatic engagement that is fully voluntary. How this would look is the old classical liberal foreign policy of neutrality. The United States could talk with Iran, trade with Iran, and even condemn the atrocities that the Iranian regime commits against its citizens. It ought to be the role of a free country to serve as an example of liberty and not to impose it at gunpoint.
Conclusion
The American strikes on Iran are not this noble crusade that the state wants you to think they are. It is the imperialism of the past, with countless victims. The political class together with the military-industrial complex will benefit the most. War expands the state; it always has and always will. No further offensive strikes on Iran.
