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diego garcia
Trump Threatens Iran With 'Bombing the Likes of Which They Have Never Seen'
Despite U.S. intelligence once again finding Iran is not currently developing nukes, the president is trying to force Tehran into a nuclear deal after unilaterally abrogating an existing one in 2018.
Mar 31, 2025
Iran's military has reportedly readied ballistic missiles for possible launch against U.S. bases in the Middle East after President Donald Trump renewed his threat to wage war on the country if it does not reach an agreement with his administration regarding nuclear weapons—which American intelligence agencies have repeatedly found Tehran is not building.
Trump discussed Iran during a Sunday phone call with NBC News' Kristen Welker, telling her that "if they don't make a deal, there will be bombing, and it will be bombing the likes of which they have never seen before," adding that there is also "a chance that if they don't make a deal, that I will do secondary tariffs on them like I did four years ago."
Ayatollah Seyyed Ali Khamenei, the supreme leader of Iran's theocratic government, warned Monday that "if any hostile act is committed from outside, though the likelihood is not high, it will undoubtedly be met with a strong counterstrike."
Esmaeil Baghaei, a spokesperson for Iran's Foreign Ministry, said on social media Monday that "an open threat of bombing by a head of state against Iran is a shocking affront to the very essence of international peace and security."
"It violates the United Nations Charter and betrays the safeguards under the [International Atomic Energy Agency]," Baghaei added. "Violence breeds violence, peace begets peace. The U.S. can choose the course."
Iranian Gen. Amir Ali Hajizadeh, commander of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps' (IRGC) Aerospace Division, noted Monday that "the Americans have 10 bases in the region, particularly around Iran, and 50,000 troops based in there."
"This means they are sitting in a glass house; and when one sits in a glass house, one does not throw stones at others," he added.
The Tehran Timesreported Monday that Iran's military has "readied missiles with the capability to strike U.S.-related positions" and that "a significant number of these launch-ready missiles are located in underground facilities scattered across the country, designed to withstand airstrikes."
The U.S., meanwhile, is amassing firepower including B-2 Stealth Bombers at its base on the forcibly depopulated island of Diego Garcia in the Indian Ocean for possible use in strikes against Iran.
Trump today: If Iran does not agree to a deal “There will be bombing and it will be bombing the likes of which they have never seen before” Can he go 1 day without threatening a new war? How many would he like? - Greenland - Panama - Gaza - Mexico - Yemen - Somalia - Gaza - Venezuela Is 8 enough?
— Secular Talk (@kylekulinskishow.bsky.social) March 30, 2025 at 8:36 PM
Trump's threat to attack Iran—which hasn't started a war since the mid-19th century—comes despite U.S. Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard testifying before the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence last week that "Iran is not building a nuclear weapon and Supreme Leader Khamanei has not authorized the nuclear weapons program he suspended in 2003."
U.S. intelligence agencies have repeatedly come to the same conclusion since the George W. Bush administration.
However, Gabbard added that "Iran's enriched uranium stockpile is at its highest levels and is unprecedented for a state without nuclear weapons."
That's at least partly due to the unilateral U.S. withdrawal from the landmark Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA)—also known as the Iran nuclear deal—in 2018 during Trump's first administration.
Since Trump abandoned the JCPOA—which was signed in 2015 during the Obama administration by China, France, Germany, Iran, Russia, the United Kingdom, and the United States—Tehran has been operating advanced centrifuges and rapidly stockpiling enriched uranium.
While there were hopes of a renewed deal during the tenure of former U.S. President Joe Biden, no agreement was reached, and Iranians continue to suffer under economic sanctions that critics have said are killing people and crippling the country's economy.
Earlier this month, Trump sent a letter to Khamenei in which he claims to have said, "I hope you're going to negotiate because if we have to go in militarily, it's going to be a terrible thing."
On Sunday, Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian left open the possibility of indirect talks but said that the U.S. could not be trusted to keep its word.
"We don't avoid talks; it's the breach of promises that has caused issues for us so far," Pezeshkian said during a televised Cabinet meeting. "They must prove that they can build trust."
This isn't the first time that Trump has threatened Iran. In 2020, during his first term, the president vowed to strike 52 sites across Iran "very fast and very hard" if it retaliated for the U.S. assassination of IRGC commander Gen. Qasem Soleimani in Iraq. Later that year, Trump had another message for Iran: "If you fuck around with us, if you do something bad to us, we are going to do things to you that have never been done before."
On the campaign trail last September, Trump told Iranians he would "blow your largest cities and the country itself to smithereens" if he was reelected and Iran didn't cease what he perceives as threats against the United States.
While the U.S. has never directly attacked Iran, it did help overthrow the country's reformist government in 1953 and supported a repressive monarchy for decades leading up to the Islamic Revolution of 1979. The U.S. backed Iraq during that country's eight-year war against Iran, during which then-Iraqi President Saddam Hussein's forces used chemical weapons against Iranian troops and his own restive Kurdish population. In 1988, a U.S. warship in Iranian waters accidentally shot down Iran Air Flight 655, killing all 290 passengers and crew aboard. Then-President Ronald Reagan blamed the incident on the "barbaric Iranians."
The U.S. has also
supported the People's Mujahedin of Iran (MEK), a State Department-designated terrorist group that had previously assassinated six American officials, and successive U.S. administrations have used international financial institutions to punish Iran, like in 2007 when Bush pressured the World Bank into suspending emergency relief aid after the 2003 Bam earthquake, which killed more than 26,000 Iranians.
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Chagossians 'Deplore' Deal Allowing US-UK to Keep Diego Garcia Air Base
"We remain powerless and voiceless in determining our own future and the future of our homeland," one diaspora Chagossian said in response to the agreement.
Oct 03, 2024
Activists on Thursday decried a deal under which the United Kingdom will cede sovereignty of the Chagos Archipelago to Mauritius with the exception of Diego Garcia, an island from which the Indigenous Chagossian people were forcibly expelled over half a century ago to make way for one of the world's largest and most important U.S. military bases.
The agreement—which was announced Thursday by the U.K. and Mauritius governments—grants the latter full sovereignty over the remote Indian Ocean archipelago, while allowing the United States and Britain to keep the joint base on Diego Garcia for the next 99 years. Under the deal, Mauritius authorities will facilitate Chagossians' eventual resettlement of the archipelago, with the apparent glaring exception of Diego Garcia.
"Following two years of negotiation, this is a seminal moment in our relationship and a demonstration of our enduring commitment to the peaceful resolution of disputes and the rule of law," a joint statement published by the U.K. and Mauritius governments states. "Negotiations have been conducted in a constructive and respectful manner, as equal sovereign states, on the basis of international law, and with the intention of resolving all outstanding issues between the United Kingdom and Mauritius concerning the Chagos Archipelago, including those relating to its former inhabitants."
"The treaty will address wrongs of the past and demonstrate the commitment of both parties to support the welfare of Chagossians," the statement adds. "Mauritius will now be free to implement a program of resettlement on the islands of the Chagos Archipelago, other than Diego Garcia, and the U.K. will capitalize a new trust fund, as well as separately provide other support, for the benefit of Chagossians."
U.S. President Joe Biden welcomed what he called the "historic agreement," which he said represents a "clear demonstration that through diplomacy and partnership, countries can overcome long-standing historical challenges to reach peaceful and mutually beneficial outcomes."
Some Chagossians also welcomed the deal. Isabelle Charlot, chair of the Chagos Islanders Movement, told BBC Radio 4 that the agreement gave her hope that her family could return to "a place that we can call home, where we will be free."
Other Chagossians decried the deal. The advocacy group Chagossian Voices—which is based in Crawley in West Sussex, England—said in a statement:
Chagossian Voices deplore the exclusion of the Chagossian community from the negotiations which have produced this statement of intent concerning the sovereignty of our homeland. Chagossians have learned this outcome from the media and remain powerless and voiceless in determining our own future and the future of our homeland. The views of Chagossians, the Indigenous inhabitants of the islands, have been consistently and deliberately ignored and we demand full inclusion in the drafting of the treaty.
"We remain powerless and voiceless in determining our own future and the future of our homeland," Chagossian Voices founding member Frankie Bontemps told the BBC.
Diego Garcia was once home to around 1,500 Creole-speaking Chagossians and their beloved dogs. However, in the 1960s the U.S. convinced Britain to grant it full control there and subsequently began to "sweep" and "sanitize" the atoll of its Indigenous population, in the words of one American official.
"We must surely be very tough about this," one British official privately wrote, adding that "there will be no Indigenous population except seagulls."
Many Chagossians were tricked or terrorized into leaving. U.S. Marines told them they'd be bombed if they didn't evacuate, and Chagossians' dogs were gassed to death with fumes from military vehicles. The islanders were permitted to take just one suitcase with them. Most were shipped to Mauritius, where they were treated as second-class citizens and where many ended up living in poverty and heartbreak in the slums of the capital, Port Louis.
Meanwhile—and without any apparent sense of irony—the U.S. military dubbed the new Halliburton-built base on Diego Garcia Camp Justice. In addition to launching an unknown number of attacks on countries including Afghanistan, Pakistan, and Iraq from Diego Garcia during the ongoing so-called War on Terror, the U.S. military also dumped large amounts of human sewage into a protected coral lagoon on the atoll, belying British claims of commitment to ecological stewardship.
The forced displacement of the Chagossians was largely hidden from the U.S. and British public. However, the Chagossians never stopped fighting for justice. Britain's High Court of Justice twice ruled that their removal was illegal. In 2010, WikiLeaks published a secret U.S. diplomatic cable exposing nefarious intentions—denying Chagossians their right of return—behind the establishment of a marine reserve around the atoll.
In 2019, the International Court of Justice in The Hague issued an advisory opinion that the U.K. was exercising "illegal" sovereignty over Diego Garcia and urged the British government to "decolonize" the atoll by handing sovereignty to Mauritius, whose government long contended it was forced to cede control in order to secure its own independence from Britain.
Responding to the new agreement, Human Rights Watch (HRW) said Thursday that while the deal will "address the wrongs against the Chagossians of the past," it "looks like it will continue the crimes long into the future."
"It does not guarantee that the Chagossians will return to their homeland, appears to explicitly ban them from the largest island, Diego Garcia, for another century, and does not mention the reparations they are allowed to rebuild their future," HRW senior legal adviser Clive Baldwin said in a statement.
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From Galapagos to Guam: US Military Bases are a Threat to Local Communities
My family’s home has been forced to leave our ecological future in the hands of the United States military, one of the largest polluters globally
Jun 20, 2019
This month I got two of the most distressing pieces of news I could imagine. The first was a headline: US to use Galapagos island as a military airfield. The second came from my grandmother: two of our family friends are in the end stages of Agent Orange poisoning.
I'm from Guam; one of the countless islands of the Pacific used by the United States military as a base. At just 8 miles wide and 30 miles long, about a third of our island is covered by military installations with more build-up expected. My family and my community know all too well what being used as an airfield means. 52,000 veterans have organized into the group Agent Orange Survivors of Guam to lobby for benefits related to their exposure to the infamous herbicide while serving in the Pacific.
While we are home to a vibrant indigenous community, beautiful and sadly rare flora and fauna, and a rich history, we are also home to stockpiled chemical weapons, countless ammunitions, regular bombings and live-fire trainings, and more consequences of a military positioned for a world of constant danger.
Former Ecuadorian president, Rafael Correa, took to Twitter after the announcement of the airfield saying, "Galapagos NO es un 'portaaviones' para uso gringo." Galapagos is "not an aircraft carrier" for the Americans. The sentiment is a familiar one. Many know my island as the United States' "unsinkable aircraft carrier." While we are home to a vibrant indigenous community, beautiful and sadly rare flora and fauna, and a rich history, we are also home to stockpiled chemical weapons, countless ammunitions, regular bombings and live-fire trainings, and more consequences of a military positioned for a world of constant danger.
Along with the physical consequences of being used as a military base, CHamorus (the indigenous people of Guam) and others around the US's more than 600 bases globally know the threats to sovereignty these installations bring with them. For CHamorus this has meant 500 years without self-determination as well as a system of rights that is left to the discretion of a Congress 8,000 miles away from Guam. The inhabitants of the island Diego Garcia experienced forcible removal from their homes as build up began. Panama created a constitution that would specifically allow United States military intervention resulting in 24 invasions between 1856 and 1989.
Ecuador's constitution explicitly states, "establishment of foreign military bases or foreign facilities for military purposes shall not be allowed," as the nation is "a territory of peace." Defense Minister Oswaldo Jarrin insists that no installation will have "permanence".
This reasoning has been seen in justification of United States presence at the Soto Canal Air Base in Honduras. While officials insist that the U.S. forces are simply "guests" on the site of the Honduran Air Force Academy, the installation is now more than 30 years old. As reported by the Associated Press in the late 80's, some U.S. officials describe the build-up as "temporary but indefinite."
Many of these bases are within indigenous communities, particularly communities whose natural environment is deeply integrated to a nation or a people's culture.
My family's home has been forced to leave our ecological future in the hands of the United States military, one of the largest polluters globally. In the Department of Defense's latest plans, about 1,000 acres (about 8%) of Guam's remaining native limestone forest will be razed. The sites of planned build-up are culturally significant to CHamoru people and artifacts continue to be unearthed as construction continues.
CHamoru activists and members of the State Historic Preservation Office have expressed needs to halt construction. Linda Aguon, the office's divisional supervisor, said, "We keep discovering things, we keep discovering things. Can't we just stop?" She was joined in questioning the planned build up by Senators Therese Terlaje and Kelly Marsh.
An environmental director with Marine Corps Activity Guam, Al Borja, responded insisting, "Will we preserve in place for latte shards from a pot that was dropped? That's not going to happen because I know the ranges have to be where they are, and that's not going to force us to reconsider this." Sentiments like this from representatives of the United States military, for me, are a reminder of the massive land seizures by the Department of Defense following the liberation of my grandmother and about 13,000 other CHamorus from a World War II era concentration camp.
In August of 1944, Guam was to become the forward base for United States attacks targeting Japan and to accomplish this goal the military seized 82% of the land of the island for military purposes (this is the high water mark of American land holdings on the island). Anyone without explicit authorization to access American military bases would be shot on sight if they were found on what had been taken as military land. Eighteen construction and engineering battalions immediately began construction of military outfits including what is now known as Anderson Airforce Base and began using it as the flight strip from which daily bombings of Japanese territory would occur by way of B-29's.
Since then just a few families have received little, in any, compensation for their lost land or severe health problems consistent with exposure to continuous simulated war.
This is a problem that has global importance. A report by Brown's Watson Institute published last week found that the average annual carbon footprint of the United States' military-industrial complex is about on par with that of the Netherlands: 153 million metric tons per year. And this is a conservative number given the secrecy of the Pentagon and the reporting loopholes for military organizations written into the Kyoto Protocol.
The Pentagon has significantly acknowledged the threats that continued carbon consumption poses. One of the report's authors, Neta Crawford, explains "We have defense forces so they protect us. If in the long run, these defense forces make us less secure then we need to rethink what we're doing." Still, build-up continues in Guam and, apparently, on Galapagos.
For the communities affected by these military installations, the continued political, cultural, and medical issues represent a far greater threat than that which the bases supposedly protect us from. They are an affront to self-determination and spell the end for a place's environment.
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