Is regime change in Iran actually possible?

Israel’s strikes on Iran may be about more than nukes — they could mark the start of a campaign for regime change, with US backing

Israel's campaign to set back Iran’s nuclear program also reflects a grander shared, if mostly unspoken, ambition among Western and Arab allies: to end the country’s clerical regime. The terrible record of regime change efforts by the West has muted such hopes – but Israel’s early successes in the war are giving them interesting new life.

The assessment of whether the regime might actually collapse is certainly a factor in America’s calculations of how much deeper to be involved. The current posture of non-involvement is, of course, implausible. Israel would never have acted against U.S. wishes: it depends on America for the spare parts that keep its air force running, for a diplomatic shield at the United Nations, for legal cover against international tribunals, and for critical support in intercepting Iranian missile and drone retaliation.

That Israel also struck right around the 60-day deadline President Trump had given Iran for engaging in useful talks – which Iran brazenly flouted, even announcing a new enrichment site on the day before the attack – also points in the direction of coordination. But on the other hand, Trump is averse to military action and the United States has vulnerable military personnel, assets, and bases scattered across the region.

That said, only the United States has the bunker-busting capability to fully take out the most fortified elements of Iran’s nuclear program, the underground facilities at Natanz and Fordow. There is a scenario, after Israel does everything else, where it may look attractive.

It is reasonable to expect the Trump administration to first try a return to diplomacy, but of a more muscular variety than had been telegraphed in recent months. In what might have been misdirection, the U.S. seemed to be headed towards a renewed version of the same Obama-era nuclear deal that Trump walked away from (unwisely, in my view) in 2018.

But that was before the humiliation endured by the regime since Israel began its strikes Friday: Israeli jets have controlled Iran’s skies, having wiped out air defenses; a host of senior figures including the heads of the military and Revolutionary Guards as well as the top nuclear scientists have been killed; many missile launchers have been disabled and a host of nuclear sites badly damaged. Most missiles sent from Iran have been intercepted, though some did get through and more than 20 people in Israel were killed.

With the regime thus exposed, perhaps Trump will finally issue the long-overdue ultimatum to Iran’s clerical regime – not only to hand over its enriched uranium but also to end its outrageous efforts to undermine a swath of Arab countries with proxy militias (as well as discontinuing production of long-range ballistic missiles plainly directed at Israel).

If this happens and Iran stuck to its old positions, a U.S. military strike becomes not implausible. And from there, it is easy to envision escalation, especially if Iran hits at American targets like the Al Udeid airbase in Qatar.

At that point, undermining the regime itself might be openly on the table. In a possible scenario, key Iranian energy infrastructure is taken out and regime buildings in Tehran are destroyed, triggering panic and forcing the ruling elite to flee the capital – accelerating internal collapse.

Depending on what happens then, longer-term regime change efforts might be accelerated in a strategic way: through cyberattacks that disrupt command systems, maximal sanctions, and information campaigns that expose corruption and amplify dissent. Quiet support to dissident networks and aggressive diplomatic isolation can further erode the regime’s grip.

Would any of that be defensible? Do countries not retain the right to govern themselves in whatever way they internally work things out? Such questions are never clear – but the regime change case is good.

By nearly every standard, the Islamic Republic has lost its legitimacy. It governs without meaningful consent, relying on violent repression, censorship, and an unaccountable clerical elite. It is anti-democratic by design, structurally incapable of reform, and fundamentally at odds with the aspirations of Iran’s overwhelmingly young, urban, and globally aware population. It remains standing not through popular support but because of its efficiency in suppressing dissent, its control over the economy, and the fear it instills. Numerous waves of protest have been murderously quashed.

Internationally, Iran’s legitimacy is further eroded by its rather obvious pursuit of nuclear weapons, sponsorship of terrorism, and serial violations of human rights.

The Iranian proxy militia project has devastated the region: Hezbollah has turned Lebanon into a failed state; Hamas and Islamic Jihad have perpetuated cycles of war in Gaza and the West Bank; the Houthis have destabilized Yemen, attacked Gulf states and led to the deaths of 400,000 people; Shiite militias in Iraq have undermined sovereignty and terrorized civilians. Dismantling these tentacles would not just restore regional balance — it would free Arab states from the permanent hostage situation engineered in Tehran.

Indeed, Israel has already gone quite a distance in this direction by effectively decapitating and partly disarming Hezbollah last fall in response to a year of rocket fire which displaced tens of thousands in its north. That has enabled Lebanon to establish a new government which is making its first steps to reassert its sovereignty – and also contributed to the felicitous December fall of Syria’s Bashar Assad, whom Hezbollah had helped prop up.

Given all this, one could certainly argue that the Iranian regime has lost its right to demand noninterference by being a menace to its region. But that still leaves the question of practicality, as history is littered with failed regime change efforts from outsiders.

The U.S.-backed invasion of Iraq toppled Saddam Hussein, but unleashed chaos, insurgency, and years of sectarian war. In Afghanistan, twenty years of Western nation-building collapsed in eleven days, ending with the odious Taliban back in power in Kabul. The Bay of Pigs invasion was a debacle that only strengthened Cuba’s Fidel Castro. The CIA-backed overthrow of Chilean socialist Saldavor Allende led to decades of dictatorship and considerable regret. More recently, Libya collapsed into anarchy after the fall of Moammar Gaddafi, and U.S. attempts to influence regime change in Venezuela have gone nowhere.

What these cases teach is not that regime change is always doomed, but that external actors cannot impose internal legitimacy, decency and stability. You cannot liberate a people who aren’t prepared to act — or who might see you as the greater threat.

Iran is a deeply nationalistic society, even if the people mostly despise the Islamist regime. Any intervention that appears externally driven risks strengthening the regime's narrative and provoking backlash. The Revolutionary Guards thrive on the image of Iran as a besieged fortress. A misstep could entrench them further.

So while regime change is not impossible, it must ultimately be home-made. The challenge is that the clerics have constructed a dense architecture of fear, dependency, surveillance – and also economic patronage that enriched the men with guns. Civil society is fragmented, the opposition in exile is divided, and many are economically tied to the state.

Given that, the most plausible scenario is a palace coup: a rupture within the military, perhaps even inside the Revolutionary Guards themselves. Both organizations have suffered humiliating setbacks in recent days, and it is not inconceivable that to protect their corrupt financial interests they might eventually dump the aging clerical leadership, beginning with 86-year-old Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei.

That, really, is the main precedent that applied to events that are romantically remembered as revolutions. In Romania in 1989, it was the moderate wing of the Communist Party and segments of the security apparatus that turned on Nicolae Ceaușescu. In Egypt in 2011, the army responded to mass protests by removing Hosni Mubarak to preserve its own status – and the perks that come with its deep embedding in the economy and business.

Of course, in Iran all this would be much aided if the top clerics might be compelled to flee Tehran for fear of their lives. Might Trump authorize the carefully calibrated steps that could lead to such a scenario?

For all his hawkish rhetoric, America’s problematic president has shown a consistent aversion to prolonged military engagements – on top of an odd disdain for his own military and even for the Western alliance. He criticized the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, avoided conflict with North Korea, and even declined to retaliate militarily after Iran shot down a U.S. drone in 2019. Yet he is also deeply drawn to dramatic successes and personal credit. Israel’s successful strike campaign may prove tempting to a leader who thrives on optics and seeks a legacy that might finally afford him a small measure of consensus.

A scenario where Trump issues a sweeping ultimatum to Iran, demands the dismantling of its missile and proxy projects, and positions himself as the architect of Iran’s “freedom moment” might fit this brand. What follows that could be very interesting indeed.

At a moment of grave uncertainty, one thing is not in doubt: Even though a period of chaos may follow a collapse of the regime, the 90 million people of Iran deserve better than the theocratic prison they’ve been consigned to since 1979.