The Lead
Trump Hasn't Bombed Iran Yet—But Mankind Needs a Better Approach
by Stewart Battle (EIRNS) — Jan. 15, 2026
After multiple days of heightening tensions around Iran, with threats by U.S. President Trump to launch a new round of military strikes there, Trump appeared to dial back some of this on Wednesday—perhaps after realizing how enormously idiotic such a move would be. “We’ve been told that the killing in Iran is stopping—it’s stopped,” Trump said to reporters at the White House on Jan. 14. When asked whether military action was now off the table, he said, “We’re going to watch and see what the process is, but we were given a very good statement by people that are aware of what’s going on.” According to Iran’s Ambassador to Pakistan, the U.S. Administration informed Tehran the same day that it will not attack the country and asked that Iran also exercise restraint with regard to attacks on U.S. bases in the region.
While a welcome development, Iran will of course be recalling how similar assurances were given by the U.S. President last June shortly before he sent B2 bombers to attack Iran’s nuclear sites—a fact which underscores the dangerous reality facing the world today.
On Jan. 12, U.S. diplomat and former ambassador Chas Freeman told an EIR emergency roundtable: “We are here to avert a tragedy—the apparently inexorable unfolding of foreseeably terrible events. As German President Frank-Walter Steinmeier has just warned us, we are in the midst of a ‘breakdown of values’ that is turning the world ‘into a den of robbers, where the most unscrupulous take whatever they want,’ and where entire regions or countries are treated as the property of a few great powers.” He warned that the United States is now imitating “its Israeli protectorate into protracted war on the truth, repudiation of the rule of law, and shameless bullying and violations of the sovereignty of all who oppose it. The already wealthy once again feel free to rob the poor with impunity. We are back to the law of the jungle and aggressive imperialism. Ever more governments emulate the Mafia’s protection racket practices and intimidation techniques. If this is not stopped, we are headed for a second Dark Age.”
This situation is only made worse by Trump’s neocon-2.0 style of invading Venezuela, and his expanding threats that Cuba, Colombia, and Mexico may be next. Additionally, Trump’s threatened approach to Greenland—to take it “the easy way or the hard way”—is not only destructive toward peace in Europe, but it will also intensify tensions with both Russia and China. The increasing brutality by ICE agents and related officials on the streets of the United States is also shredding all semblances of lawfulness and morality.
Trump wasn’t the first to invent the doctrine of “might makes right,” nor the current barbaric practice of treating those you disagree with as human animals, but he may be the last to use it if mankind does not quickly change course. A new attempted “Pax Americana,” or “Pax Romana,” is doomed to fail—especially at a time when the majority of the world is looking to build a new international order that is free from the grips of Western colonialism.
The panel of speakers at the Jan. 12 EIR Emergency Roundtable are preparing to release a declaration that will be of immediate importance to circulate to institutions and governments around the world. So keep your eyes on EIR.news for that in the coming hours. As Helga Zepp-LaRouche, EIR’s Editor-in-Chief, said at the Emergency Roundtable: “The most urgent question is, can mankind act in time to avoid the looming civilizational catastrophe? Given that we are the only species gifted with creative reason known in the universe so far, can we change the course of action and create the means of self-government which allows not only overcoming the actual strategic crisis, but to create the conditions for the durable survival of humanity?... Our aim is to approach all governments that are members of the United Nations, and suggest to them that they should convene an emergency conference of the UN General Assembly or an equivalent appropriate institution with the intention to restore international law based on the UN Charter and in line with the Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence….”
Zepp-LaRouche went on, saying that such an international discussion must start from the standpoint that a new method of thinking in the world is required: “This must be the agreement that we have reached a point in the universal history of mankind where we must agree to always put the interests of mankind as a whole first before we define any national or other particular interests. This is to acknowledge the fact that we are, for the first time in history, all sitting in one boat; that because of the existence of nuclear weapons, the use of which would end civilization, the existence of pandemics which can expand over the entire world in a matter of days, the existence of the internet, etc., we are interconnected as one human species and must act accordingly.”
Contents
Strategic War Danger
- Trump Had Second Thoughts (↓)
- U.S.-Iran Tensions Spike, Then Ebb (↓)
- Trump Reportedly Told Iran He Would Not Attack (↓)
- Iranian Foreign Minister Says Terrorists Tried To Draw Trump into Iran's Conflict (↓)
- Report Back from Denmark and Greenland Foreign Ministers After Meeting Vance and Rubio (↓)
- Zelenskyy Declares State of Emergency in Kiev on Energy (↓)
New World Paradigm
- Victory for the Belt and Road Initiative: Budapest-Belgrade High-Speed Railway Completed (↓)
- Putin Warns against 'Might Makes Right' Approach, Stresses Necessity of New Security Architecture (↓)
LaRouche movement
U.S. and Canada
Harley Schlanger Update
Watch The Daily Update with Harley Schlanger, a short video update available every weekday morning from The LaRouche Organization.
