Long term potential for relief for Iranians - major economic crisis, temporarily suppressed by war conditions - IRGC will struggle to solve issues of inflation etc - a path to slow regime shift
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How the ceasefire itself and details of how it unfolded shows that pragmatists more open to reform got the upper hand over the hard right in the IRGC. Pragmatists and reformists working together. None of them are advocates of a modern democracy or bill of rights. But they are pragmatist and reformist in Iranian politics.
This is just the first of many new challenges for Iran that need creative thinking, pragmatism and a pressure towards reform to solve them. It’s going to be a major economic challenge to restore the damage caused by the war. That’s a situation where those who can’t shift in position will get left behind.
This isn’t the immediate regime change many Iranian people wanted. But they may be able to get a slower regime shift over a period of time,
The talks in Islamabad couldn’t have happened if the hard right in the IRGC were in charge. Indeed they couldn’t even have talked to each other face to face under the previous Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei.
Also importantly, Motjaba Khamenei, his son, and the new Supreme leader, authorized the ceasefire. He also authorized the talks and gave the delegation the power to make on the spot decisions.
All this shows a major shift under the new Supreme Leader and shows that he too is a pragmatist or he’d never have authorizied the Islamabad talks. He is not a clone of his father.
He has been personally severely affected by the strikes. His father assassinated, and others in his close family. According to reports he is himself disfigured with his face scarred and leg damaged.
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Khamenei’s face was disfigured in the attack on the supreme leader’s compound in central Tehran and he suffered a significant injury to one or both legs, all three sources said.
He is taking part in meetings with senior officials via audio conferencing and is engaged in decision-making on major issues including the war and negotiations with Washington, two of them said.
The Iranian legal system has a codified system of revenge, based on strict interpretation of Sharia law (one of the very few Muslim countries to have Sharia law as part of its legal system at all).
Motjaba has the legal right in Iran to seek for the assassins of his father (Israelis) to be assassinated. But he can also set this aside thorugh a system of legal forgiveness. Not forgiveness in his heart. Forgiveness as a legal concept. It’s an unusual legal system.
He must have chosen legal forgiveness or in some other way is focusing on the best future for Iran and his regime (the main other way is not to choose forgiveness but rather just set aside revenge in the interests of the State).
For the background see my:
And not only that he has made a major shift towards pragmatism and also accomodating the reformists, far more than his father did.
So when Trump says that the new leaders are easier to talk to - this is correct. Commenters often poke fun at him for calling it a regime change. Well regime change is indeed too much. It’s not that. But a significant regime shift.
The American negotiating team could never have talked face-to-face with ANY Iranians before he was assassinated.
So - could Trump eventually get his regime change but in a different way, as a slower shift over a longer period of time after the end of the war? Gradually, as the regime has to handle the economic crisis and reconstruction?
Not driven by a wish for democracy. Driven by pragmatism with the pragmatists in collaboration with the reformists.
For the background see my
This blog post is based on the last section of my debunk here,
Or indeed could this lead to a full reform / regime change later? That may be too much to hope for but some regime shift may be possible.
Very interesting article from Foreign Policy from just before the ceasefire, combined with new articles from Iran International leading to a more optimistic view of potential for the Iranian citizens too.
Iran International has an op edit that says amongst other points:
Before the US- Israeli strikes, Inflation was over 70%, bread and grains rising by 140% and cooking oil by more than 200%
During the war, demand fell, due to unemployment, banking disruptions and falls in property and automobile transactions
85% of the petrochemical industry destroyed by the strikes
The steel industry also devastated and the steel supplies other industries like the plastics industry so the full impact will come later
The IRGC can’t tax its way out
Approved budget has 65% rise in taxe but roughly 60% of working-age individuals are unemployed
Post war military expenses and reconstruction obligations increased sharply
no significant new revenue streams
Then to make it worse:
Iran can no longer use Dubai which previously was a central hub for trade and currency transactions of $16 billion to $28 billion per year
when markets reopen the rial is likely to be repriced sharply downward -
even with the best-case outcome of diplomacy, the inflow of technology and capital won’t start for weeks
unless the risk of new strikes can be stopped completely, investors won’t want to invest new capital
https://www.iranintl.com/en/202604097047
That is another reason for Iran to want to ensure there is no possibility of the strikes resuming, so it can rapidly start reconstruction.
And these are the very conditions that led to the protests against the regime last year, but magnified much more.
For an optimistic take on this (My own idea, not set out in the Iran International claim) - this seems precisely the types of economic and social pressures that might pressure the new regime to significant changes in how it operates. Perhaps Trump’s war will achieve a measure of regime change but in a different way from intended?
It is if the conditions get so difficult to solve that the lower ranks of the IRGC and even commanders start to question the regime that there may be internal regime change. Based on pragmatism rather than ideology. This is based on some of the sources I read while researching this, but putting together like this is a synthesis.
This is research published before the Iran war about how internal pressures like this from the IRGC itself could lead to regime change
Iran’s growing internal unrest and external failures present a strategic opportunity for the United States and its allies. The West should begin planning for a future without the Islamic Republic. The Islamic Republic’s foundational pillars—religious legitimacy, economic governance, and regional power—are in collapse. Though the regime still holds coercive control through its security forces, it has lost its societal foundation. Regime change in Iran is no longer a distant hope—it is an increasingly likely outcome. The question for Western leaders is not if it will happen, but how to help shape a peaceful, stable, and democratic transition.
And after the assassination of the Supreme Leader but before succession of Motjaba Khamenei
Foreign policy has an article about this about how the pragmatists have an uphill fight but they have a fair bit going for them. This is before the ceasefire.
That they agreed to the ceasefire at all is very promising as it shows that the pragmatist won internally and it shows that Motjaba himself is a pragmatist.
[WILL ADD BULLET POINT SUMMARIES TO MAKE THIS EASIER TO READ]
QUOTE STARTS
The pragmatists have an uphill fight. Unlike the hard-liners, they have little armed power. They have also lost trust with the Iranian people for either weakly condemning or outright backing the regime’s brutal suppression of popular protests. But Iran is in chaos, and reformist insiders have the experience needed to guide the government onto more stable ground. They can capitalize on the fact that the hard-liners’ ranks have been decimated by U.S. and Israeli strikes to take the reins of power. To do so, however, they must appeal to Iran’s frustrated, long-suffering citizens by promising a more peaceful, prosperous, and politically free future.
…
But not everyone in the regime wants Iran’s future to look like its past, especially given that its policies helped lead to disaster, and some of them are willing to push for a different trajectory. That includes Pezeshkian. In March, in the midst of the war, the president asked the IRGC to work with his government to preemptively address Iran’s dire postwar economic situation. According to reporting by IranWire, when a young IRGC officer brushed Pezeshkian off during a meeting, declaring that a perpetual state of emergency would be good for Tehran because it would ensure that no Iranians “dare to voice dissatisfaction,” the president was incredulous. “That is no answer!” he shot back. “Does it mean that once the war is over, we must kill another round of protesters? Is this what you call planning?”
That doesn’t mean prying Iran away from the IRGC will be simple, given its raw coercive capacity. But although the Guards’ relative power within Iran has increased since the attacks began, their absolute power has been diminished. It was, after all, the IRGC’s strategy and policies that led Iran to the brink of defeat, bankrupted its economy, and turned vast swaths of the Iranian people against the regime. That has cost the corps internal political capital, making it vulnerable to attacks from critics within the regime. It has gained authority now that Ali Khamenei is no longer around to serve as a check. But his death also costs the IRGC its biggest and most powerful supporter.
The IRGC may also struggle to muster its coercive capacities. The war has ravaged its ranks, including by killing many of the most capable personalities, such as Ali Larijani, a top security official, and Ali Shamkhani, a senior adviser to the elder Khamenei. Meanwhile, the most competent reform-minded leaders were mostly spared. That includes Pezeshkian, Rouhani, and Khatami, the last of whom remains the country’s most prominent reformist.
…
There is a final group that could force Tehran to change course: ordinary Iranians. They are the most powerful potential source of national legitimacy. They have not yet had a true champion within the government, but there has never been a better opportunity for someone inside the regime to act as one. In fact, the best chance for an enterprising regime insider to either circumvent the IRGC or force it to change would be to appeal directly to the people.
The mass protests of the past have not brought about substantial reforms. But Iranian society still has classes with real influence. One is the country’s small merchants, or bazaaris, who make up a small percentage of Iran’s population but control the traditional economy and important urban centers. During the first two decades of the Islamic Republic’s history, the bazaaris were the theocracy’s most important constituency, yet years of economic instability have eroded their support for the regime. Similarly, Iran’s many trade unions and guilds have influence over Iran’s energy and transportation sectors and have suffered from the country’s decline. If the bazaaris and the labor groups united, they could bring much of the economy to a halt through strikes and boycotts.
Iran’s younger generation could also prove to be a potent ally. The young have no connection to the 1979 revolution and know the regime only for corruption and cruelty. Their lives have been shaped by decades of conflict and privation. They have led most of the recent protests and have suffered the most from the regime’s violent campaign against dissent. Yet they are still the most politically energized demographic. An enterprising politician pushing for change could gain millions of enthusiastic followers by successfully motivating this cohort.
…
The United States should try to help empower these more pragmatic elements in ways beyond simply killing their hard-line competitors. Washington should, for example, engage diplomatically with whoever is willing to talk. Having a direct line to Washington would by itself give pragmatic elements more potential influence inside the system. The United States should also proactively offer measured inducements to Iran, such as targeted sanctions relief, in exchange for its willingness to compromise on key areas. Even the more moderate Iranian leaders are unlikely to accept maximalist demands from Washington, but they could agree to incremental steps that initially focus on the nuclear issue and later expand to the military and foreign policy. U.S. officials could also push Iran to allow for greater social freedoms and to end the persecution of religious minorities—steps that would reduce anti-regime sentiment within Iranian society.
…
The regime’s pragmatists are hardly advocates of democracy; even though it was the hard-liners who drove Iran into the ground, the country’s moderates were fully complicit. But despite all the bombings, the regime remains intact, and there is no viable alternative that is ready to replace it. As a result, the most effective way to transform Tehran for the better is to work with insiders who support change. They know how the system works and how to work the system. And after decades of dominance by ultraconservatives, Iran’s tumult means these moderates finally have a shot at enacting change.
https://www.foreignaffairs.com/iran/real-war-irans-future
That Foreign Affairs article was skeptical about the ability of Motjaba to take control and counter the far right influence of the IRGC
QUOTE
By the time he was killed, Khamenei was the only remaining check on the group’s whims, ensuring that although the IRGC got what it wanted most of the time, it was never totally triumphant. Now, it has no peer. Whether Mojtaba Khamenei lasts or not (as of this writing, U.S. officials say he is injured), the supreme leader’s office will no longer have the standing to impede the Guards’ agenda. The new supreme leader will be as much an agent of the IRGC as its overseer.
https://www.foreignaffairs.com/iran/real-war-irans-future
[You can read it for free with an emai subscription]
But he seems to have done so. Just because he works behind the scenes does not mean he is impotent and under the Iranian constitution, he has considerable power, he has the last word on everything of importance.
The proposed negotiating team may be led by the parliamentary Speaker and include the Iranian foreign minister Aragchi.
The pro-government ISNA news agency reported that parliamentary Speaker Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf would lead Iran’s delegation to the talks scheduled to begin Friday in Islamabad, Pakistan. Within half an hour, the IRGC-linked Tasnim News Agency contradicted the report, saying the composition of the delegation had not yet been finalized by the “relevant institutions.”
The conflicting reports highlighted uncertainty over who would lead the delegation and underscored the rivalries that often shape decision-making in Tehran.
The first official statement on the ceasefire came from Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi, a longtime diplomat with close ties to Iran’s security establishment.
In a post on X, he emphasized that he was speaking “on behalf of the Supreme National Security Council of the Islamic Republic of Iran,” and thanked Pakistani officials “on behalf of the Islamic Republic of Iran,” language that appeared to project broad institutional authority.
President Massoud Pezeshkian, who cannot join the negotiating team for protocol reasons, issued a largely symbolic statement—seemingly intended to remind the public that the country still has a president expected to lead the government. Like several other officials who had advocated a ceasefire from the outset, Pezeshkian framed the temporary truce as a “victory for Iran.”
Moments after Iran signaled its reluctant acceptance of the ceasefire, Nasim Online, an outlet close to the IRGC, published a statement from the Secretariat of the Supreme National Security Council.
President Pezeshkian is progressive relative to the far right Iranian politics and in favour of negotiations and a nuclear deal.
Abbas Araghchi is also strongly in favour of a nuclear deal and is reasonably described as pragmatist and progressive.
Ghalibaf is a conservative and with a backround in the oppressive security service. However he tries to reframe himself as a pragmatist who gets things done and spent many years as Mayor of Tehran getting things built.
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For all his hardline rhetoric, for all his long record in the security state, he is one of the few senior figures left in Tehran who can plausibly be described as both a regime insider and a functioning political operator. He belongs to the Islamic Republic’s military elite, but he has also spent years trying to translate that pedigree into broader governing authority. That combination is what makes him matter.
…
This dual image—manager and enforcer—became the central theme of his political life. When he entered electoral politics, he did not present himself primarily as an ideologue. He presented himself as a “managerial” conservative, a doer, a man of action. He wrapped himself in technocratic language without ever really severing ties to the security state.
…
For twelve years, from 2005 to 2017, he ran the capital and used it to build what he hoped would be a presidential platform. These were the years in which he most successfully crafted his public myth. He could point to visible projects: tunnels, highways, bridges, metro expansion, and urban redevelopment.
He portrayed himself as the executive the country needed, someone who got things done while others talked. Among conservative voters exhausted by factional bickering and reformist voters disillusioned by ideological rigidity, this image had some appeal.
…
Ghalibaf wanted to be seen as an administrator; many still saw him as a commander. In 2017, he did not even make it to the finish line, withdrawing in favour of Ebrahim Raisi. It was a humiliating but rational move. The system was consolidating around other figures, and Ghalibaf once again adjusted.
That ability to adjust is one reason he remains standing. After failing repeatedly to win the presidency, he shifted to parliament. In 2020, he entered the Majlis in a low-turnout election heavily tilted in favour of hardliners (reformists were basically prevented by Khamenei from running) and quickly secured the speakership.
It was not the office he had wanted most, but it gave him something he had long lacked: a national political role rooted in direct electoral office, however constrained the electoral environment had become. It also placed him among the senior institutional heads of the state and offered him a platform from which to remain relevant in succession politics and wartime decision-making.
https://en.majalla.com/node/330251/profiles/mohammad-bagher-ghalibaf-possible-us-partner
In short
President Pezeshkian is progressive relative to the far right Iranian politics and in favour of negotiations and a nuclear deal.
Abbas Araghchi is also strongly in favour of a nuclear deal and is reasonably described as pragmatist and progressive. Also technically competent and architect of the JCPOA.
Ghalibaf is a conservative and with a backround in the oppressive security service. However he tries to reframe himself as a pragmatist who gets things done and spent many years as Mayor of Tehran getting things built.
This seems to be the team that Trump is engaging with and with the backing of Motjaba.
Not new people. The same as before but this shows that the reformist pragmatists have come out top in the new regime. It also shows that Motjaba is pragmatist too.
None of them are pro democracy but in terms of Iranian politics they are pragmatist and reformist rather than far right and could lead to regime shift over time rather than sudden regime change.
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