The Iranian regime has been in power for forty-two years. In the span of the past few decades, the Iranian people have protested against the regime consistently, the most notable being the Green Movement protests after the 2009 Presidential Elections. However, unlike the protests that led to the fall of the Pahlavi dynasty in the late 1970s, protests against the Islamic Republic of Iran have failed to enact regime change in the way they once had. I have examined the various factions within the United States that push for regime change in Iran, focusing specifically on their methods for enacting this change. This paper will discuss the catalysts for regime change in 1979, conditions that inhibit regime change today, and lastly what the United States role is within the context of regime change in Iran. From my research, the most supported American policy between academics, journalists and policymakers to enact Iranian regime change is one of maximum-pressure sanctions in line with a maximum-support campaign for the Iranian people. I argue that a policy of maximum-pressure contradicts maximum support for the Iranian people, as maximum pressure sanctions diminish Iranian resolve and capabilities to enact formative regime change.
Why Regime Change Occurred in 1979
By 1979, the majority of the Iranian population had been resolute in fighting against the authoritarian US-backed Iranian Shah, in part due to the decades of repression that occurred under Mohammad Reza Shah and his father who ruled before him, Reza Shah, and in part due to the continued broken promises made by Mohammad Reza Shah to improve Iranian life. The reforms implemented by Mohammad Reza Shah during his role mirrored his fathers’ - they were largely ineffective and allowed the Shah to further strengthen his iron grip on the country. In 1963, Mohammad Reza Shah launched the White Revolution, a series of modernization efforts including land reform and increased women’s rights (Ansari). In theory, the reforms were intended to signal to the international community and the Iranian people that Iran was a powerful and modern country in line with the likes of the great powers of the United States and Great Britain. However in practice, many of these reforms, such as the various land reform efforts (“Rural Socioeconomic Changes”), resulted in the worsening of living conditions for peasants and poorer populations. By 1977, it was clear that conditions for ordinary Iranians continued to worsen as a result of the State poor strategy (Ritter) and Iranians had begun to coalesce in large numbers to protest against the government. While the majority of initial protests particularly consisted of university students, the protests against the government garnered massive public support, particularly also as a result of the United States’ close relations with Iran. During this era, the United States President was Jimmy Carter, who lauded the cause of human rights internationally. Therefore, the human rights rhetoric of Carter as well that of the greater international community permeated throughout Iran and led to many protesting the gross violations of human rights committed throughout the Pahlavi dynasty. The revolutionary cause soon extended past students and the middle-class, and people of all socio-economic backgrounds entered the fold to protest for a common cause: a new regime. Different factions of Iranian society with competing ideals for a new Iran, including the Tudeh (communists), the Mojahedin, and the Islamic clergy, came together, united behind the goal for regime change. The unity of Iranian dissent against the Pahlavi regime greatly aided the anti-regime coalition.
Another factor which greatly contributed to the fall of Mohammad Reza Shah was the vast strides Iranian society had made as a result of increased education and living standards. While many of Mohammad Reza Shah’s reforms, as well as his fathers, Reza Shah, were futile and a mechanism to gain more power within the regime’s framework, both Mohammad Reza Shah and Reza Shah greatly advanced modern education systems in Iran, including the education of women. The education movement included the creation of many primary and secondary schools throughout the country, as well as the creation of top universities that still exist today and produce some of the world’s most accomplished scholars. The advent of modern education, particularly higher education, allowed for increased liberal thoughts to occur within those created spaces. University students were the foundations of the revolution, largely because their education had allowed them the freedom of thought and expression, and realizing a better future for themselves that didn’t include the authoritarian Iranian regime. Furthermore, many University students had studied in foreign universities in France, the United States and the United Kingdom. Upon their returns to Iran, they were imbued with a renewed understanding of liberal democratic ideal. Once it was clear that Mohammad Reza Shah was unable to deliver on his promises of a better Iran for the people, resistance erupted, culminating in his forced exile and the creation of the Islamic Republic.
What Inhibits Regime Change in the Islamic Republic Today
The conditions that were created in pre-revolutionary Iran which led to the fall of the old regime are no longer present within the Iran of today. Iranian dissent nationally and internationally is greatly fragmented. Some support Reza Pahlavi, the son of the last Iranian Shah, some support the Mojahedin-affiliated National Council of Resistance of Iran, and many support no one, simply the general idea of regime change. Regardless of the supported faction, there is no majority consensus on who will lead Iran in the case of regime-change. In this regard, regime-change has not been a viable solution for the Iranian people because they have lacked a formative figure to embody their revolution, and whom they can present as an alternative to the current regime in order to gain more support. In contrast, not only was the Revolution of 1979 a concerted Iranian effort encompassing various factions of dissent as discussed early in the paper, but the Revolution’s persona, particularly by 1979, was embodied by Ayatollah Khomeini, who had been exiled from Iran in the 1950s and continued to incite anti-regime rhetoric from exile, which increased both the anti-regime movements popularity, as well as his own.
Another great inhibiting factor towards regime change in Iran today is the minimized resolve and capability of the Iranian people to fight against the regime. The State apparatus for quenching dissent has continued to remain strong and resilient in the past 42 years of its rule. While Iranians have been protesting in large numbers against the regime since 1979, the State has used the security and military forces to violently silence protest movements from gaining large traction. The largest protest movement in Iranian post-revolutionary history has been the Green Movement of 2009, in which Iranians protested en-mass against the rigging of the 2009 Presidential election which favored conservative hardliner Mahmoud Ahmadinejad (Seyed). However, the success of the Green Movement is underlined by the response given by the State in regards to the protests. According to Edelman and Takeyh, “Mohammad Ali Jafari, then the head of the IRGC [Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps], conceded that the protests had brought the regime ‘to the border of overthrow’” and in 2013, “Khamenei told an audience of university students that the Green Movement had posed ‘a great challenge’ and brought the government to ‘the edge of the cliff,’” (135). This underlines the power of mass protest movements within Iran, and the potential for them to succeed. However, for their success, Iranians must be able to continue their protest and withstand violent government response. This is where the United States’ role in regime change in Iran comes in.
What is the Role of the United States in Enacting Regime Change in Iran
It is first and foremost important to understand the decades-long political strife between Iran and the United States. In 1953, the United States’ CIA in coordination with Great Britain’s MI6 orchestrated a coup d’état against democratically elected Prime Minister Mohammad Mossadegh, in favor of Reza Shah Pahlavi, who was seen to be an ally of Western powers. Iranians who once viewed the United States as a champion of freedom and liberty in contrast to imperialist Great Britain, grew painfully aware of the United States’ false democratic facade and neo-liberal grand strategy. Disappointment within the Iranian population and diaspora continued to grow after this era, with the radical islamic sector of the Iranian population taking advantage of this moment, fostering anti-American sentiments which accumulated in the 1979 Islamic Revolution. In undermining Iranian democracy and reinstating a leader which many viewed to be a dictator, the United States forced Iranians to revolution, paving the way for another tyrannical figure to come into power, further destabilizing the country and its relations with the West.
Animosity between the two countries has only continued to grow stronger and more lethal since. First with the Iranian hostage crisis that prompted Anti-Iranian demonstrations within the United States, following with the United States’ involvement in the Iran-Iraq War, and most importantly, the implementation of sanctions that froze Iranian assets and barred the United States and its allies from dealing with Iran, dating back to the beginning of the revolution in 1979.
In light of the United States’ role in the undermining of Iranian sovereignty in 1953, Iranian regime change cannot be positively enacted through U.S. military intervention or other operations of the sort. If this were to occur, it would result in continued Iranian distrust not just with the United States, but with their new government, recreating the mistakes of the past.
Iranian regime change can only be positively enacted through the will of its people, however the United States can and should provide technical and logistical support to Iranian dissent to empower them to enact the change they seek. U.S. policy to do so consists of four crucial aspects towards regime-change. The first should be to provide covert financial assistance to protest movements, particularly unions who have striked against the government. In the Revolution of 1979, a major factor that led to the fall of the Shah was the strikes carried out by oil and transportation workers. Similarly, the current regime faces massive strikes made by “steelworkers, truckers, bus drivers, railway workers, teachers, and sugarcane workers,” (Edelman and Takyeh 139), however these strikes have largely remained short-lived because of the economic pressure it puts on strikers. Therefore, to support continued Iranian protest against the regime, which could likely lead to the fall of the current regime, the United States should provide covert financial assistance to strikers, to ensure that they continue their strikes, further crippling the Regime’s economy.
The second is to sow distrust within the state apparatus of repression through granting asylum to government defectors. By doing this, the United States would effectively create an environment of distrust and suspicion within the regime, resulting in mass purgings within the government that will weaken the regime from the inside. The current regime, in contrast to the Pahlavi regime, does not have good relations with the West. Therefore, defectors, or in the case of regime change, exiled officials, would have to retreat to countries such as Syria, Lebanon or Russia, rather than lavish in the comforts of exile in the United States, France, or Great Britain, as the Pahlavi regime was able to do (Alterman and Sadjadpour). Thereby, in the case of imminent regime collapse, it is highly likely that the prospect of American exile would be welcomed by a government or IRGC official. In this event, not only would the United States be purging the Iranian government of crucial manpower, but the United States would also gain invaluable assets that would provide top secret government information, increasing national security.
The third is increased technological assistance to the dissent to enable the uncensored dissemination of protest movements and their goals. According to Edelman and Takyeh, “... it is essential for the United States to supply the regime’s critics and opponents with technology and software that they can use to evade censorship, communicate with one another, and get their messages out,” (139). To do so, the United States would need to invest money into the creation of not only Persian-led media sources, such as Voice of America, but also invest money into the creation of software accessible to the Iranian government to create “imagined” public spaces for dissent to occur. Within the current context of Iran, public spaces do not allow the Iranian people to coalesce together in the same way they did during the Revolution of 1979. The Iranian public space of today has become overrun by government security forces, inciting fear within the Iranian psyche. This, coupled with complete government censorship of media, prevents the Iranian people from being able to communicate their revolutionary ideology with each other. Therefore, U.S. software and technological know-how will allow a re-imagination of the Iranian public space, one in which the public space will be transferred to one's phone, laptop and television. The power of media consumption to both create a strong coalition of already existing dissent, as well as the introduction of those outside of the dissent framework currently, will greatly aid in the formation of a strong and powerful force to combat the Iranian regime.
The fourth and final policy decision that should be implemented by the United States to facilitate Iranian-led regime change is the removal of the Trump administration's maximum-pressure sanctions. Contrary to Edelman and Takyeh, who argue that U.S. involvement in Iranian regime change would include the continuation of the “successful” maximum-pressure sanctions implemented by the Trump administration (140), I argue that the most formative U.S. policy to empower the Iranian people towards regime change is the removal of all maximum-pressure sanctions.
As discussed earlier, maximum-pressure sanctions have largely affected the Iranian population, reducing their capabilities and resolve towards enacting regime change, rather than their intended purpose of weakening the government. Iranian-American policy analyst at the Carnegie Endowment, Karim Sadjadpour, argues that “it's been proven throughout history that popular uprisings don't tend to happen when people feel most destitute. They actually tend to happen when people's quality of life is starting to improve, and their expectations start to rise but then those expectations are unfulfilled,”(Alterman and Sadjadpour). Under the economic stress of maximum-pressure sanctions, coupled with the devastating effects of the Coronavirus pandemic, the Iranian people are largely unable to strengthen their resolve against the current regime. The reality is that the Islamic Republic will never be able to provide the Iranian people with the economic success they envision - government corruption and system mismanagement ensures this. Upon lifting maximum-pressure sanctions, however, the Iranian economy will undergo a short-term boom, one which will enrich the lives on many Iranian citizens, who will then be able to have the luxury and resolve of protest. According to Sadjadpour, “People will then have heightened expectations of how [their lives will improve] economically, but ultimately, the Islamic Republic is never going to be able to deliver on the expectations that Iranians have,” (Alterman and Sadjadpour). With the government no longer being able to point their fingers at the United States for their economic failures (Goldstone), the people will realize that it is not the United States at fault, but their own government. This will result in an outpour of condemnation against the government, and has great potential to be the ignition for regime change.
Furthermore, after decades of sanctions, and years of maximum-pressure sanctions, the Iranian government has failed to falter to the United States’ goals of nuclear non-proliferation and ceased terrorist funding. Iran continues to provoke the United States with nuclear proliferation and continued funding of terrorist organizations such as Hezbollah, continuing to be a national security threat to the United States. In addition, the efficacy of sanctions in achieving goals set by the implementor country are widely contested. Omar Abdelsamad, editor-in-chief of the Harvard International Review, in regards to sanctions against Iran to prevent nuclear proliferation, has that sanctions are “wildly ineffective at producing the desired result,” (Collins). Furthermore, in a research study conducted by Stephen Collins arguing the efficacy of economic sanctions following the unipolar era of states-craft directly following the end of the Cold War, the analysis of United States sanctions placed on Iran for “weapons proliferation” by 1995 concluded that sanctions were wildly ineffective. According to the model made by Collins in which a “scoring system” was used to note the spectrum of sanctions contribution (by the sanctioning state), and policy change (by the sanctioned state), along with a calculated “sanction score”, U.S. sanctions placed on Iran a score of 6. Collins emphasizes that sanction scores of 9 or more constitute sanction efficacy. According to Collins model, the United States made a “significant contribution” in terms of enacting sanctions (meaning that the sanctions placed on Iran were quite considerable and damaging to the economy). In response, Iran only made “trivial policy change”, resulting in the conclusion that sanctions against Iran were ineffective in achieving their goals. Other studies corroborate this evidence.
Additionally, sanctions placed on Iran today in comparison to 1995 are more comprehensive and target multiple sectors as opposed to just the oil sector and high ranking officials. Maximum-pressure sanctions, as opposed to the sanctions placed on Iran in 1995 are not unilateral - the United States has forced their allies, as well as countries that they work with economically, to abide by maximum-pressure sanctions and not engage with Iran. Much of the scholarship on sanction efficacy relies on the assumption that sanctions placed on countries during the bipolar era (pre-late 1970s - early 1980s) were comparatively more effective than those during the unipolar era that preceded. However, the data on Iran indicates that even with bilateral support for sanctions, which increases the extent of sanctions and their assumed efficacy, the Iranian government has failed to adhere to the requirements set by the United States and the international community for the removal of such sanctions, notably continuing their state-sponsorship of terrorism and their quest for nuclear proliferation.
The consensus on Iran is clear: the regime in power today will never fully cooperate with the United States (Edelman and Takyeh 134, Khansarinia and Ghasseminejad, Farley, Alterman and Sadjadpour, Takeyh). To prevent another catastrophic military intervention into the South West Asia/North Africa (SWANA) region, furthering regional destabilization, the United States must lift maximum-pressure sanctions to allow the Iranian people to push for regime change themselves. In addition, the United States must provide financial and tactical support to regime dissent and government defectors, to secure national security interests within not just Iran, but the greater SWANA region. Given Khamenei’s rumored declining health and old age (he is 82 and has served as the Ayatollah, or Supreme Leader, of Iran since 1989), and waning support for his rumored successor - newly elected President, Ebrahim Raisi - (Sadjadpour) the United States must be willing to create an Iran-strategy on these principles immediately, to be put into action upon the death of Khamenei, taking advantage of the power vacuum that is inevitable to form. It is uncertain whether a new Iranian regime will ally itself with the United States, however, it is evident that the current regime continues to threaten the national security of both the United States and its allies. The United States therefore must do everything in its power to prevent a military conflict.
Works Cited
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