How the Iranian Regime Breaks

Over the last few weeks, the Iranian regime has faced remarkable challenges—and displayed remarkable unity. Hundreds of thousands of Iranians have taken to the streets to protest the Islamic Republic in what has become the most significant internal challenge the state has faced in its 47-year history. But the elite has not yet fractured. Instead of squabbling over how to handle the demonstrations, Iran’s reformist and hardline leaders have worked together to suppress them. To date, none of the regime’s elites objected to the killings of thousands of innocent civilians by security forces. In fact, figures from across the political spectrum have all outwardly (and falsely) blamed the violence on foreign infiltrators.

But behind the scenes, the picture is undoubtedly more tense. Unless they exclusively watch state television and believe their own false narratives, Iranian officials understand that the domestic system is under existential stress. They are aware that U.S. President Donald Trump has threatened to attack Tehran and topple the government. And most of them probably know that the forces driving the protests—including an economic crisis and decades of corruption—cannot be fixed by the country’s obstinate, reactionary leadership. As a result, Iranian officials who want to save themselves have an incentive to remove Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei from power.

If Iran’s elites do move on Khamenei, they will likely act quickly. There will be no sign to outsiders that a coup is coming. And if they succeed, a range of outcomes are possible. The Iranian apparatus has a stark divide between its older and younger generation, and so the character of the next government would depend on which cohort ends up leading it. If the old guard is behind a successful coup, Iran’s next regime will probably remain theocratic at home but become less ambitious abroad. If younger officials take over, Iran will likely grow less religious at home but remain assertive internationally.

Neither camp is likely to bring about democracy. The reason that either group would depose Khamenei, after all, is to preserve its influence. An internal move against the supreme leader would still evince the further erosion of the Islamic Republic. But the uncomfortable truth is that democracy and freedom in Iran will require either external support or that factions inside the ruling system, backed by a segment of the armed forces, join with the Iranian people. Short of that, any political change in Tehran is more likely to be about preserving aspects of the status quo.

ROTTING AWAY

For decades, predicting the end of the Islamic Republic has been a fool’s errand. The regime has faced all kinds of crises—wars, mass protests, high inflation—without cracking. Its theocratic system steadily isolated the country, destroyed its economy, and subjected its people to stifling social restrictions. But it retained a powerful security apparatus, and thus proved capable of repeatedly quelling even widespread dissent.

So far, Iran has been able to use its military and police to tamp down on the most recent round of demonstrations. But these protests have, nonetheless, weakened the ruling system. The sheer size, energy, and diversity of this popular uprising—combined with the immense toll of the crackdown—has further rubbished any claim to legitimacy that the Islamic Republic might have hoped to retain among Iran’s people. The regime has now lost the support not only of the country’s young but also of traditionally conservative cities and regions. It has alienated one of its most important constituencies, the small merchant class, or bazaaris. And unlike others in the not so distant past, these protests have come at a time when Iran is weak. The country’s once-vaunted network of regional allies has been greatly degraded, and its economy is suffering from chronic shortages and persistent inflation. The regime, meanwhile, has shown no ability or willingness to make the hard decisions needed to either restore the country’s security or improve its economy.

Change will come to Iran; the question is what kind of change it will be. The most obvious transition, and the one that would mirror the desires of the masses who took part in the protest movement, would be a popular revolution that dismantled the Islamic Republic’s theocratic system, removed its corrupt elite, and fundamentally transformed Iran’s political, economic, and social landscape. Yet for a popular revolution to work, segments of the regime would need to defect to the people’s side and support the Islamic Republic’s destruction. And, for now, the forces preserving the status quo remain united.

A coup would likely come without warning and be lightning fast.

Another way to buoy a popular revolution would be for the world to provide external pressure. As people take to the streets, the United States and its allies could either kill or capture Iran’s core leadership, destroy much of the regime’s repressive infrastructure, and then install a caretaker government. Such a scenario is the only way to remove the regime from power if its elites refuse to enact change on their own. But although the Trump administration may yet decide to take such a route, a regime change operation carried out by the United States would likely require a substantial commitment by the American military, and so no one should count on it happening. There is also a risk that such an operation might fail to produce a stable, new government even if it succeeds in ousting the old one, and lead to prolonged conflict in the country—particularly if elements of Iran’s security forces remain armed and committed to the Islamic Revolution.

That leaves a coup d’état as the most plausible way Iran’s present system might fall, at least in the near term. Iranian officials may have a seemingly endless ability to repress their people, but even they cannot escape the uncomfortable truth that the regime has hit a low point and that Khamenei and his chief advisers lack the decisiveness and vision needed to chart a pathway forward. The regime is at risk, but the current leaders are incapable of making fixes. It is exactly at times such as these that elites in authoritarian countries start thinking about saving themselves by deposing their leaders.

Right now, there are no outward signs that regime officials will try to take down Khamenei. There are rumors that certain reformist elites have been taken into custody, but they have not yet been substantiated. Even if conditions worsen and the regime’s grasp grows more precarious, some elites will seek to preserve what they have rather than try to effect change: their money will flow to foreign bank accounts, and their extended families will move to vacation homes abroad. But other, more ambitious insiders might start to plot against their superiors.

Such plotting is unlikely to be visible from the outside. The regime is deeply paranoid and constantly hunts for elite schemes that don’t exist. But if there were an actual, coordinated effort that had a chance of succeeding, it would likely come without warning and be lightning fast. The ruling apparatus, in other words, would collapse gradually, and then suddenly.

THE TIES THAT DIVIDE

If Iran experiences a coup, it will most likely be carried out by the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps, the most powerful branch of the Iranian military and the strongest actor inside the country. There would be an irony in such a move, because the IRGC serves as the principal guardian of the theocratic system and has benefited the most from Khamenei’s tenure. But the corps also has the most to lose if Khamenei is toppled through a popular uprising or through foreign intervention. As a result, should IRGC commanders decide that the supreme leader’s power is slipping or that it presents an obstacle to relieving pressure on the regime, they might opt to take ownership of political change in order to preserve their vaunted position.

The IRGC is a sprawling institution, so what happens in the wake of its coup would depend on who leads it. If officials from the corps’s intelligence office, whose primary mission is internal security, ended up in charge, the state might turn inward and become even more repressive and paranoid. If a coup originated in the Quds Force, whose primary mission is foreign operations, Iran’s external interests would be prioritized.

But the IRGC’s most important fault line is less organizational than generational: the institution is divided between its top command and its younger middle-ranking officers. The former are mostly appointees of the supreme leader who gained their positions through their loyalty to Khamenei and their ideological orthodoxy. They got their start soon after Iran’s 1979 revolution and bonded on the frontlines of the Iran-Iraq war in the 1980s. They are part of the Islamic Republic’s first generation and remain committed to its founding principles, including its Islamist social ordinances and an ideological foreign policy. They have benefitted greatly from their insider status, growing rich through endemic corruption. Their families lead easy lives, often abroad, and they have enjoyed immense influence within the system.

The younger generation, by contrast, started their careers during Iran’s post-2003 rise to regional prominence. They are veterans of conflicts in Iraq, Lebanon, and Syria, which gave them a taste of what Iran’s power could achieve. Though they are not secular, they have a more pragmatic view of social issues and are thereby less wedded to the social strictures that have defined the Islamic system. They are also more hawkish on foreign policy, more committed to restoring Iran’s power, and less hesitant to use military force in the region. But they have not yet had the opportunity to cash in on their status through lucrative command positions and have therefore not materially benefited from systemic corruption to the same degree as their leaders.

A coup is unlikely to turn Iran into the democracy that its people seek.

If an IRGC coup is led by the organization’s elite inner circle, the resulting government might prove willing to compromise on Iran’s nuclear and missile programs—both already badly damaged—in exchange for sanctions relief from Western countries. Such a move could assuage Iran’s small merchant class, which is concerned about the economy above all else, as well as international actors (including Washington). It might also sap energy from the protests, making them easier to crush. But this old guard would not end Islamic rule nor address the corruption that underlies Iran’s economic volatility. Rather, such coup leaders would be acting purely out of self-interest. Their goal would be to safeguard their status in the system and to buy time.

The IRGC’s middle-ranking officers, by contrast, would pursue a coup primarily out of ambition. If they stood by and the Islamic Republic ended up collapsing, they would have neither grown fat from corruption nor had a chance to lead the state. Their careers would be cut short. Their prospects under a populist takeover would be dim. A coup would provide them the opportunity to take the reins of the Islamic system and remold it.

The IRGC’s younger cohort does have a stake in the present system; its members, too, have benefited financially and politically from their positions. But they do have more reasons to be disillusioned with the supreme leader and his apparatus, which have made terrible decisions that undid the corps’s hard-fought regional wins. If they were to lead a coup, the changes to the regime could therefore be more sweeping. These leaders would also probably be more willing to abandon some of the sacred totems of the Islamic system—the role of the supreme leader first and foremost, but also social laws that have radicalized Iran’s youth against the regime. They would instead place a greater focus on Iranian nationalism and military might.

But that doesn’t mean they would abandon Iran’s foreign policy. In fact, as a generation that came up during Iran’s rise, they might be even more committed to transforming Tehran into a formidable and respected power than their superiors. The way they do so, however, might shift away from the narrow conception of anti-Western resistance favored by Khamenei. They could remain antagonistic to Israel and retain Iran’s focus on regional policy but be more pragmatic in dealing with the United States and less inclined to shore up Tehran’s flailing proxies. Moving beyond a foreign policy fixated on backing terrorist groups would help facilitate an expansion in Iran’s military power through more conventional means, particularly its evolving ties with China.

MEET THE NEW BOSS

Regardless of what faction is behind it, a coup is unlikely to turn Iran into the democracy that its people seek. In fact, preventing that would be the point. A coup would be pursued first and foremost to keep elements of the existing system in place and better insulate them from internal and external pressures, not to fundamentally restructure the regime.

But the splintering of the system’s elite would be one more step in the Islamic Republic’s dissolution. Khamenei’s leadership has clearly failed the Iranian people and kept the regime mired in crisis, and the cumulative stress of persistent conflict, sanctions, and societal unrest is undoubtedly creating friction behind the scenes. A break within the present regime, however it arrives, would at a minimum further weaken the foundations of the theocracy. It would be an admission from insiders that this system is sick and unable to heal itself through constitutional processes.

It would also be a sign that the pressures amassed against the Islamic Republic have, indeed, chipped away at it, bit by bit. Most importantly, it would usher in an era of change—less the preservation of the Islamic Republic than the beginning of its downfall.

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