As tensions escalate in West Asia, talk of regime change in Iran is once again surfacing in capitals across the world. The question is, if Ayatollah Ali Khamenei is taken out, as Israel wants to do, who will replace him?
Israel바카라™s success in the military campaign so far has expanded the goal of the operations from destroying Iran바카라™s nuclear capacity to regime change that could result in a ``friendly government바카라™바카라™ in Tehran. America could will-nilly be drawn into supporting Israel바카라™s plans of regime change.
Iran has no credible opposition, though there are several civil rights groups in the country. Political opponents have long been locked up. Experts say perhaps another Shia cleric will take up the mantle, but this time more strongly controlled by the military leadership. Though considerably weakened with the top general decapitated in the June 13 attack, it still remains intact. No one really knows what happens if Khamenei is out of the scene. Can the US risk a nation of 80 million descend into chaos? This fear of uncertainty has led the US to hit the pause button for now.
President Donald Trump is giving diplomacy a final chance, with the White House announcing late Thursday that the United States will take a decision on entering the war within the next two weeks. The red line has, however, already been drawn by Trump; Iran will have to stop its uranium enrichment immediately, in short, effectively roll back its nuclear program.
On Friday, Iran바카라™s foreign minister, Abbas Araghchi, met with his counterparts from Britain, Germany, France and the EU. Expectedly, the meeting ended without a breakthrough. Iran is willing to hold direct talks with the US, but not under duress. Israel will have to stop its attacks for talks to proceed.
Washington, particularly President Donald Trump, has no appetite for getting into the mess of another nation바카라™s internal affairs. In fact, the President바카라™s envoy Steve Witkoff had been in touch with foreign minister Araghchi all through the time after Israel바카라™s attack.
Trump and his MAGA base are against US involvement in foreign wars, that it see as a waste of precious American lives as well as taxpayers' money. Trump바카라™s base is divided over this issue as never before.
Ideologues and Trump supporters like Steve Bannon and Tucker Carlson are leading the charge against getting into another war abroad, while another section, most of them traditional Republicans who are staunch supporters of Israel, believe this is a golden chance to put a lid on Iran바카라™s nuclear ambitions forever. Aware of the division within his support base, the President is pushing for a diplomatic solution.
The United States had interfered in the past in Iran. In 1953, the US and Britain orchestrated a coup to help the then-young Shah Reza Pahlavi to overthrow the democratically elected prime minister, Mohammad Mossadegh. This was because Mossadegh wanted accountability from the Anglo-Iranian oil company, a British firm that the PM suspected had not paid royalties due to Iran. The company refused to submit to an audit of its books, Mossadegh nationalised the country바카라™s oil industry and expelled foreign oil companies from Iran.
Mossadegh was proving a liability to Western interests, and the Shah was unable to get his way. The US, as well as Britain (than an important power) smelt an opportunity of making huge profits from Iran바카라™s oil and gas, and a pro-Western ruler like the Shah would smoothen the process.
The Iranian army, with the backing of the US and Britain, organised a coup that overthrew the government of Mossadegh and strengthened the position of the Shah. The Shah had a modern mindset was for women바카라™s rights, frowning on those who wore the hijab--- this is why, for many Iranian women before the revolution, the hijab became a symbol of protest.
But he was a ruthless tyrant and threw thousands of dissidents to prison where they were tortured and often died. His excesses led to the Islamic Revolution of 1979 and the rise of the powerful theocratic regime in the country. Iran바카라™s dislike of the West stems from their support for the Shah.
Regime change several decades later in Iraq, Libya, and Afghanistan has had the same disastrous results.
Iraq
The perils of regime change are starkly illustrated by the U.S. invasion of Iraq in 2003, that too on the false pretext that Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction. The UNSC was bypassed and the then US President George Bush and the UK바카라™s Labour prime minister Tony Blair unilaterally decided to eliminate the Iraqi leader. The same dictator that the US had sided with during the eight-year war (1980-1988) with Iran.
While the objective was to topple Saddam Hussein and install democracy, the aftermath plunged the country into chaos. The dismantling of Iraq바카라™s institutions and security forces created a power vacuum that gave rise to sectarian violence and ultimately paved the way for the emergence of ISIS바카라”one of the most brutal terrorist forces of recent times that carried out mass killings and destabilised the entire region.
For years, Iraq became a killing field, with tens of thousands of civilians caught in the crossfire. Far from bringing peace, the intervention turned America into a reviled occupier, drawing hostility and attacks across the Middle East. Donald Trump, who was a business tycoon then and had not entered politics, had been critical of the Bush administration for getting into an unnecessary war.
Afghanistan
The US invasion of Afghanistan was after the 9/11 terror attacks. Al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden, the man who planned these attacks, was then hiding in Afghanistan, where the one-eyed Mullah Omar was. He refused to hand over Bin Laden as America had demanded, and then President George Bush sent his army in to replace the Taliban. Since 2001, the American army remained bogged down in Afghanistan. Billions were spent in promoting democracy, equal rights for women and liberal values.
Yet 20 years later, America had to negotiate and bring back the Taliban it had once fought. In Afghanistan, things are back to square one; women no longer have the right to education, to public space, institutions assiduously built up in the years when the US was in the country, no longer work. So, apart from costing billions and billions of US taxpayers' money and lives of both Afghans and US and NATO soldiers, the US has nothing to show for its two decades of wasted effort.
In Libya, the socialist-minded Gaddafi, once a friend of the West, was taken out in 2011, and Libya has since never had stability. His removal led to the many tribes constantly fighting with each other in an effort to take control. The US did not have boots on the ground in Libya but was instrumental, together with the UK and France, to topple Gaddafi.
Iraq and Afghanistan were sold as a mission to liberate and democratise, only to end in prolonged chaos and bloodshed. As Washington weighs its next moves with Tehran, the question remains: will the U.S. repeat the mistakes of the past, or has it finally learned the limits of regime change?
