On Iran and crackdowns

So I've made a few videos on how terrible Prime Minister Carney of Canada is for backing the US in the war it started on Iran, and one question I get is how come I don't talk about how Iran cracked down on protesters so brutally before the war started. To answer, let me

paint a picture. And that picture is of a country that contains a lot of economic value, both in terms of natural resources and strategic location. And the leaders of the country wishes to use that wealth in a way that the global superpower of the world doesn't appreciate.

And so the global superpower, after failing to coerce the leaders into doing its bidding, slaps the country with crippling economic sanctions and even secondary sanctions that penalize anyone in the world daring to do business with the country. This is collective punishment of course and aims to make the lives of the people so miserable that they will revolt and replace the stubborn government with one presumably more compliant with the superpower.

When this doesn't work the intelligence agencies of the superpower take advantage of the impoverished population and recruit spies and infiltrate with their own agents; starting campaigns of sabotage, assassination, and fomenting unrest, in addition to the ongoing economic warfare, to achieve the goal of regime change.

And the two questions that come to me from this, are one, is this country allowed to fight back against this kind of external pressure, and two, if so, how?

The answer to the first is of course, yes, countries are allowed to protect themselves. That's cut and dry.

The second though is where things get messy, because, it may be my limited imagination, but I cannot think of any way that a country can fight back against spies and traitors inciting unrest, maybe even assassinating scientists and visiting foreign leaders, that isn't oppressive and brutal.

Let us be clear, the choice being forced by the superpower on the leaders of the country is whether they live on their knees, or die on their feet for their people. And I can appreciate the opinion that, faced with such a choice, it is maybe better to give in especially as "dying on their feet" includes everybody around them, regardless of age or anything else, dying in horrible ways as well.

But I cannot forget that the core issue here has been imposed by the outside. That it is the superpower that is the root cause of all this horror. And maybe it is a limitation of how my mind works, but once I see the source of a problem I cannot bring myself to focus on the symptoms of it. Which the protests and the crackdown both are.

Imagine what Iran would be now if the West had never interfered with it as it has been doing constantly from at least 1952 until now, with all else failing, it has resorted to destroying schools and hospitals and attempting to do to Tehran, what it has already done to Gaza.

All opinions my own, in the end only God knows best.