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Weekend Reads
Tehran has weathered repeated nationwide protest cycles in the last 15 years. That history matters—but it no longer governs the present moment. The Islamic Republic is dying. Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei may suppress this round of protests. The leadership may survive this year. But it will not emerge from 2026 with its authority, cohesion, or capacity preserved.
In The Free Press, Michael Doran identifies three plausible short-term outcomes—regime collapse, partial transformation, and a bare survival.
Key Insights
1. Tehran has irreparably lost control over its own economy.
A government that cannot stabilize its money or credibly tax and redistribute revenue has lost one of the basic arms of the state—and it will not recover it. The reason is structural. In practice, the Central Bank no longer controls Iran’s foreign currency at all. Sanctions have forced the regime to rely on a shadow banking system in which foreign exchange is held outside Iran. The Trump administration has put a clear offer on the table: Dismantle both the nuclear program and the ballistic missile program and end the financing of regional proxies. In return, Iran would regain access to foreign currency, stabilize its economy, and unwind the sanction-induced shadow system that now sustains corruption and scarcity. Khamenei has rejected the offer outright. Ideology and regime identity take precedence over survival.
2. Military failures have stripped the regime of its aura of invincibility.
After October 7, 2023, Israel dismantled Iran’s regional strategy piece by piece. It destroyed Hamas in Gaza, massively degraded Hezbollah in Lebanon, and collapsed Iran’s Syrian support, culminating in the fall of Bashar al-Assad. Only after that regional structure was broken did the conflict widen into the 12-day war of June 2025, which struck Iran directly, destroying key elements of its air defenses, missile forces, and nuclear infrastructure. The nuclear program had long functioned as the regime’s central symbol of defiance against the West. Its destruction ended that claim.
3. If the regime survives, it will be only for lack of an alternative.
Iran now displays many of the classic preconditions for revolution—economic collapse, military humiliation, legitimacy erosion, and external isolation. But it lacks a decisive catalyst: an organized revolutionary leadership. The regime has been systematic and ruthless in eliminating potential leaders. What remains is an angry public that can take to the streets but cannot take control. Sustained protest does not by itself topple regimes in Iran, but it increases the probability that elite fracture, security defection, or external intervention will do so. The coercive core of the regime—centered on the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps—remains intact, cohesive, and more than willing to use force to preserve its power.
4. The immediate test will come this weekend—and American or Israeli intervention could be decisive.
President Donald Trump has warned that mass killings of Iranian protesters would trigger intervention. His recent actions in Venezuela and Operation Midnight Hammer give the warning some punch. Nevertheless, recent reporting suggests that the regime has entered a more openly repressive phase, indicating that Tehran is prepared to test Trump’s red lines. If repression fragments and disperses them, the regime may yet muddle through. If, however, violence triggers an American or Israeli response, or if it broadens participation and spreads unrest nationwide, then even survival through paralysis may no longer be possible. No matter what, the trajectory is clear. The Islamic Republic may kill protesters and try to outlast the demonstrations, but the regime can no longer restore its authority.
Quotes may be edited for clarity and length.
Go Deeper
Zineb Riboua explains three key factors that have brought the Iranian regime to the brink:
- Severe resource shortages, largely caused by the regime’s failures
- Over-reliance on unsustainable oil revenues
- Military setbacks and Khamenei’s structural inability to adapt
“The regime may survive this phase, but only by accelerating a longer-term collapse,” she writes. “It is, indeed, the beginning of the end.”
Operation Rising Lion was an inflection point for Tehran, demonstrating the regime’s vulnerability and precipitating the current spiral. In the immediate aftermath of that operation, Zineb Riboua identified how the erosion of Iranian deterrence abroad would weaken regime legitimacy at home and trigger a broader strategic unraveling.
Beyond dismantling Iran’s military capacity, Israel’s cyber assault on Iran during the Twelve-Day War caused a bank run and destroyed $90 million of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps’ cryptocurrency assets.
In The Wall Street Journal, Michael Doran and Zineb Riboua explain why this matters and argue that the United States should support future Israeli cyber operations to prepare for high-stakes cyber warfare in the future.
