Jun 17, 2025

Bulletin 361: Please call or write your senators and congresspersons immediately, asking them to support the bipartisan War Powers Resolution to prohibit direct U.S. involvement in the attack on Iran

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Dear friends and colleagues --

We hope that you, like us, are aware of -- and deeply concerned about -- Israel's war on Iran. 

We have not tried to keep you informed about this war, and we have not tried to organize any serious opposition. We wish we could, but our time is limited. 

We know that some of you -- e.g. locally, Stop the War Machine -- are doing what you can to protest this war and the U.S. role in it. Without direct U.S. help, Israel's attacks could not happen. (The U.K. is also involved.)

We are in a similar time-bind about the U.S.-supported Israeli genocide in Gaza. If there is a protest we can sometimes attend and help out, but we don't have time to be the "prime mover" in organizing opposition, given our other commitments.

Regarding Iran, dire developments are now occurring by the day and the hour. Trump's wild bellicosity has gone far out of control. Many of the experienced analysts we follow to better understand events in Ukraine have also been focusing on the Middle East. We refer you to them. 

At last, a somnolent Congress is showing signs of rational life. We have to help Congress do the right thing, and quickly, lest there be (more) hell to pay for all concerned, in the Middle East and of course here, where another war is about the very last thing the U.S. needs.

In the Senate, Senator Tim Kaine (D-VA) has introduced a War Powers Resolution which, if passed by a simple majority in both houses of Congress, would require a halt to any further U.S. military involvement in the war against Iran, absent a declaration of war or other specific authorization by Congress. 

In the House, Congressman Massie (R-WV), along with fourteen others including Ro Khanna (D-CA), Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY), and Don Beyer (D-VA), has introduced a similar resolution. As Code Pink's Medea Benjamin writes, conservative stalwarts and some moderate Dems are strongly opposed to war with Iran as well. 

This is a real crossover antiwar coalition, with some MAGA folks arm-in-arm with progressives, and it is important for that reason alone.

Trump could order an attack on Iran at any time, perhaps tonight. Perhaps he already has. 

There could be a false flag engineered by Israel -- an attack on a U.S. base, or on a U.S. warship, at any time, attempting to trap Trump into attacking.

If Trump did bomb Iran -- like a revenant John McCain -- Iran could strike U.S. regional bases. The lives of millions would hang in the balance, even more than they do now.

So we need to act fast.

This is not the time or place for an essay, but in our studied opinion, this has nothing to do with uranium enrichment. It has to do with regime change in Iran and remaking the Middle East, goals the U.S. and Israel currently have in common. This is a yet another neocon project that will end in tears. It has to be stopped.

If Trump does launch an attack without a declaration of war, it will be flagrant grounds for impeachment.

Greg Mello, for the Study Group