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In the past few days, the world has once again been pulled into the familiar anxiety of war in the Middle East. News alerts, breaking updates, military analysts on television, maps filled with arrows and speculation about retaliation.
For many of us watching from afar, it feels distant. But history has taught us that decisions made by powerful nations rarely stay within their own borders. The consequences travel.
As I watched the situation unfold, I wrote a simple line on my Facebook page:
“I wonder how those who voted for Donald Trump are feeling now.”
Because when a superpower goes to war or escalates conflict, the effects are not just felt in America. They ripple across the world.
Among the many replies I received - both in the comment thread and through private messages - one stood out:
“I can only speak for myself, but I'm very proud to have Trump as our president. In my opinion, he is fundamentally reshaping geopolitics, and if he succeeds, it will be better for everyone. The Iranian people have suffered for 47 years. Hopefully their freedom is near.”
The response from my American friend made me pause. Perhaps even more so because he is someone I respect deeply. He is well travelled, has spent more than half his life living in Asia, and is, in many ways, a gem of a human being.
His comment did not make me pause because I necessarily agreed or disagreed with it. It made me pause because it reminded me how differently people can frame the same story.
Yes, many Iranians have suffered under their current regime. The government that came to power after the Iranian Revolution has ruled the country for decades with strict political and social control.
But whenever I hear talk about “liberating Iran,” I cannot help thinking about an earlier chapter of history that is often forgotten.
A short history lesson
To understand how Iran arrived at this moment, we need to go much further back. The story of modern Iran is, in many ways, also a story about foreign powers repeatedly shaping the country’s political destiny.
In the late 19th century, Iran’s rulers from the Qajar dynasty often granted economic concessions to European powers. One of the most controversial came in the early 1890s when the Shah granted a British company exclusive rights to Iran’s tobacco industry.
The decision sparked outrage across the country and resulted in the country’s most senior cleric, Grand Ayatollah Mirza Shirazi, issuing a religious ruling calling for a boycott of tobacco. What followed was remarkable. Iranians from all walks of life stopped using tobacco almost overnight.
Faced with a nationwide boycott that showed no sign of weakening, the ruler cancelled the concession two years later. The episode became one of the earliest demonstrations of people power in Iranian history - and a clear rejection of foreign economic control.
That momentum helped fuel the Constitutional Revolution between 1905 and 1911, when Iranians demanded a constitution and the creation of a parliament. Yet even during this period, the country remained caught between competing foreign powers, particularly Britain and Russia, both of whom sought influence over Iran’s politics and resources.
In 1921, amid political instability and a weakened monarchy, a military officer named Reza Khan seized power in a coup, with British backing. By 1925, he had deposed the ruling Qajar dynasty and founded the Pahlavi dynasty, becoming Reza Shah Pahlavi.
During the Second World War, Britain and the Soviet Union jointly invaded Iran to secure supply routes. Reza Shah was forced to abdicate and was sent into exile. His young son, Mohammad Reza Pahlavi, was installed as the new Shah.
A decade later, Iran took another step toward democratic governance. In 1951, Iran elected a prime minister named Mohammad Mosaddegh. Popular and widely respected, Mosaddegh introduced reforms and challenged the authority of the monarchy. One of his most consequential decisions was to nationalise Iran’s oil industry so that its wealth would benefit Iranians rather than foreign companies.
That decision did not sit well with powerful interests abroad, whose economic interests were deeply tied to Iranian oil. Soon after, the United States and the United Kingdom backed a coup - the 1953 Iranian coup d'état - removing Mosaddegh and restoring the Shah, Mohammad Reza Pahlavi, to power.
For the next 26 years, the Shah ruled Iran as a close ally of the West. His government modernised parts of the country, but it was also deeply authoritarian. Political dissent was crushed, and resentment simmered beneath the surface. The Shah’s rule was also marked by the lavish lifestyles of the ruling elite and increasing poverty of the mass of the Iranian people. And resentment quietly grew.
By 1979, that resentment erupted into a revolution that overthrew the monarchy and brought the religious leadership of Ruhollah Khomeini to power.
That was the beginning of the Islamic Republic that still governs Iran today.
History raises a question
History has a way of reminding us that interventions meant to shape another country’s future often create consequences that last far longer than anyone expects.
Which is why, whenever I hear powerful nations speak about going to war to “free” another people, I feel uneasy.
Because we have seen this story before.
Foreign powers intervene. A regime falls. A new order emerges. And decades later, the same powers return again - this time promising to fix what went wrong.
So yes, the Iranian people deserve freedom. Every people do.
But history also raises a difficult question.
If outside powers helped shape the political reality that Iranians live with today, are they really in the best position to claim they are now riding in to save the day?
Or is the wiser lesson simply this: Sometimes the most powerful thing a superpower can do… is learn when NOT to interfere.
Fa Abdul (fa.abdul.penang@gmail.com) is a content creator under the Newswav Creator programme, where you get to express yourself, be a citizen journalist, and at the same time monetize your content & reach millions of users on Newswav. Log in to creator.newswav.com and become a Newswav Creator now!
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