US ability to determine what comes next in Iran might be limited.
- The San Juan Daily Star
- 4 hours ago
- 4 min read
By JULIAN E. BARNES and TYLER PAGER
U.S. intelligence agencies produced multiple scenarios in recent weeks of what could happen in Iran after a joint U.S. and Israeli strike intended to kill senior leaders and weaken the current government.
The plan to kill Iranian leaders succeeded when an Israeli strike killed Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, Iran’s supreme leader, effectively decapitating the government and achieving a key U.S. goal.
Before the strikes that began Saturday, U.S. intelligence agencies studied what would happen after the death of Khamenei. One of those scenarios suggested that a complete change in government was unlikely. Instead, it said, members of Iran’s Revolutionary Guard were likely to assert a larger degree of control but might be willing to curb the country’s nuclear program or take a more conciliatory stance to the United States.
In striking Iran on Saturday and urging its citizens to rise up and replace its government, President Donald Trump was judging that he could engineer an outcome that would be beneficial in the long run to the security of the United States and Israel. But in doing so, he set in motion events that could be hard to control and that could leave Iran in chaos for some time.
In a video released after the U.S.-Israeli strike, Trump said the current attack was the best chance for the Iranian people to take over their government.
Many questions remain about how much effort the United States will put into changing the Iranian government. Without any troops in Iran — which the Trump administration has said it wants to avoid — the U.S.’ ability to influence what comes next is limited, according to people briefed on the intelligence and planning for the strikes.
The intelligence assessments before the strike considered the likelihood of multiple scenarios playing out after a strike designed to weaken the current leadership. And U.S. officials stressed that the joint strike on leadership targets and military sites in Iran had created a high degree of uncertainty around all of the potential scenarios.
But intelligence agencies believe the organized opposition in and outside Iran remains relatively weak.
The intelligence said that even if Khamenei was killed in the operation, whatever religious leader formally took over would be a hard-liner, according to people briefed on it. But it is unclear how much influence that person would have. Trump has offered an array of theories about what kind of Iranian government would come next.
Some U.S. officials believe that leaders outside the religious chain of succession would take a more tempered approach to the United States and Israel in the wake of a massive strike — and be willing to give up Iran’s nuclear program. In this scenario, real power would lie with the remaining Revolutionary Guard leaders, who could be more likely to take a compliant stance, more focused on maintaining their economic interests and control of the country and less focused on attacking the United States or Israel.
But Trump’s comments to Iranians on Saturday went far beyond predictions of a more compliant theocratic leadership.
“Bombs will be dropping everywhere,” Trump said. “When we are finished, take over your government. It will be yours to take. This will be probably your only chance for generations.”
Sen. Mark Warner of Virginia, the top Democrat on the Senate Intelligence Committee, said the U.S. government had poor visibility into Iranian opposition groups and their strength.
“I have seen no new intelligence that changes the fact of how complicated regime change would be,” Warner said in an interview.
Warner said he thought any potential successor to Khamenei would probably be a hard-liner. And while the ayatollah has been unwilling to give up his nuclear enrichment program, Warner noted he had not decided to build a nuclear weapon, a decision a successor could change.
“Khamenei was invested in the nuclear program but held the line against full weaponization,” Warner said.
Warner also said he did not understand why Trump was pushing for regime change at this moment.
“Do we want to see the Iranian regime change?” Warner said. “Yes, but why now versus January, versus May? Other than the fact that the president created this quasi red line of calling on the Iranian people, saying, ‘Don’t worry; we will be there.’ Then it took him two months to get his armada there.”
In late January, Trump said that a “massive Armada” was heading toward Iran as he intensified threats against the country.
Mick Mulroy, a former Pentagon official who oversaw Middle Eastern defense policy in the first Trump administration, said the president was taking a big risk in calling for Iranians to rise up against their government.
“This is by definition an existential threat, and the regime will brutally repress it,” Mulroy said. “More brutal than before.”
For now, there is little public evidence the attack will lead to an immediate uprising.
Jonathan Teubner, the CEO of FilterLabs, which uses social media and internet postings to study shifts in attitudes, said the attack on Iran was creating a “textbook rally-around-the-flag effect.”
Studying Iranian posts on the social media platform Telegram and Gap, an Iranian messaging app, FilterLabs saw promises of retaliation and threats against U.S. regional bases and Israeli population centers. While such sentiments align with Iranian government messaging, they were amplified across a wide array of social media postings.
“The key question is whether this rally-around-the-flag effect bleeds off,” Teubner said. “The gap between defiant promises and lived reality could become a political liability for the current Iranian regime. But right now, Washington and Jerusalem should not expect an immediate uprising.”
Other experts agreed and said the government in Tehran has staying power.
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