The United States has consistently sought to expand its authoritarian client network by acting against adversarial governments in the region with the objective of installing more compliant regimes. Since the end of World War II, Washington has pursued regime change in the Middle East on average once per decade. The governments residing within the US-led regional order also push the United States toward status quo policies to advance their own interests, echoing the same pro-authoritarian rationales used by Washington to justify continued American support.
Freedom, therefore, was never the objective in Iran. Washington initiated the war hoping to decisively subdue Iran—the chief antagonist operating outside the US-led regional order—and, if possible, co-opt Tehran into its network of authoritarian client states. Thus far, it has achieved neither. As the costs of this war become more evident, so too will the chasm between reality and the rhetoric used to justify it.
The myth of authoritarian stability has shaped Washington’s approach to the Middle East since it first became deeply involved in the region’s affairs beginning in the twentieth century. Such policies have helped sustain authoritarianism across the region.
During the Cold War, cooperation with such autocrats was deemed necessary in order to prevent encroachment by the Soviet Union and sustain the free flow of oil out of the Middle East, leading to both Moscow and Washington competing for client states while subverting attempts at self-determination. After the Cold War, the United States emerged as the unrivaled power in the Middle East and entrenched its authoritarian patron-client network to preserve American regional predominance.
The United States doubled down on its pro-authoritarian policies following the 9/11 terrorist attacks and invasions of Iraq and Afghanistan, viewing these autocrats as essential partners in combatting global terrorism. Although talk of democracy promotion in the Middle East through regime change in Iraq was ubiquitous in the rhetoric of the Bush administration, this narrative only emerged in force after the decision to invade was already made. It was primarily a hollow legitimizing mechanism adopted by Washington to convince the public that such a war was necessary when other justifications proved fictitious. After the 2011 Arab uprisings, Washington depicted surviving autocrats as the only forces capable of reestablishing order following mass upheaval and state disintegration in Syria, Yemen, and Libya. Today, these authoritarian client states are thought to provide the United States with a comparative advantage in the region as Washington purports to pivot its focus toward China.
The myth of authoritarian stability gets things backward: rather than being the solution to the region’s problems, authoritarian regimes are responsible for producing and exacerbating some of the greatest problems in the region, and Washington’s resolute backing allows them to act with relative impunity both at home and abroad. These relationships are not necessary to protect US interests in the Middle East. In fact, they jeopardize US interests by reinforcing the root causes of unrest and conflict in the Middle East, entangling Washington in the region’s problems, and inciting hostility toward the United States.
US policy toward pre-1979 Iran epitomizes the myth of authoritarian stability and its deficiencies, while its policies since the Iranian revolution have relied overwhelmingly on coercion in the pursuit of compliance—often producing the opposite effect.
Before the 1979 revolution that established the Islamic Republic, Iran, under the Shah, Mohammad Reza Pahlavi, was central to US Middle East policy during the Cold War. Like elsewhere in the region, Washington viewed rising nationalist sentiment inside Iran as concerning, fearing it would create inroads for the Soviet Union to expand its influence. At the forefront of Iranian nationalism was the National Front, led by Mohammad Mosaddegh, who criticized foreign interference inside Iran, particularly external control of the country’s oil sector. After becoming prime minister in 1951, Mossadegh’s boldest initiative was nationalizing the Iranian oil industry, which at the time was dominated by the British-owned Anglo-Iranian Oil Company (AIOC)—later known as British Petroleum (BP).
Washington and London feared that Mossadegh nationalizing the AIOC would spark a wave of nationalization in the Gulf and boost pro-Soviet sentiments across the region. Though Mossadegh was not a communist, Washington believed deteriorating conditions and the weakening of the Shah within Iran could strengthen the communist Tudeh party domestically. Ultimately, the CIA and Britain’s MI6 orchestrated Operation Ajax, coupling a widespread propaganda effort to weaken Mossadegh with coordinating anti-government protests and orchestrating a military coup that ultimately overthrew him in 1953.
Once reinstated, the Shah’s Iran joined Saudi Arabia as the foundation of Richard Nixon’s “Twin Pillar” policy in the Gulf until 1979. Between Nixon and his successor, Gerald Ford, Washington approved roughly $17 billion in weapons to Tehran—approximately $120 billion in 2025 dollars. The Shah ruled Iran with an iron fist until the 1979 revolution, which removed Tehran from America’s sphere of influence. At the time, Jimmy Carter did not want to abandon the Shah, whom he referred to as “an island of stability in one of the more troubled areas of the world.” Carter’s special envoy to Tehran, General Robert Huyser, urged Iran’s military commanders to “kill as many demonstrators as necessary to keep the shah in power.” Ultimately, Washington could not save the Shah, and he was forced to flee the country in January 1979, after which the Islamic Republic of Iran, led by Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, replaced the monarchy, also ruling with an iron fist and animated by hostility to the United States.
Since 1979, Iran has operated outside the US-led regional order, and the relationship between Tehran and Washington has remained deeply antagonistic. Washington’s approach to Iran since the revolution has relied overwhelmingly on coercion, namely, trying to isolate and pressure Tehran politically, economically, and militarily into compliance. Paradoxically, this approach has often hardened Iran’s resistance to the United States and undermined attempts at reform.
At the core of the Islamic Republic is a “resistance culture” against external interference in Iranian affairs. Within the regime, there are two competing camps—pragmatists who favor more engagement with the West to alleviate sanctions and isolation, and hardliners who prioritize resistance through defiance and military power. Hawkish US policies have historically empowered regime hardliners by fueling their resistance narrative. Iranian foreign policy often reflects internal regime politics, namely, competition between these two camps. As Washington has increased its pressure on Tehran, so too has the balance of power inside the Islamic Republic often tilted in favor of hardliners, leading to a more militarized Iranian foreign policy.
The relationship between the regime and Iranian society is also fraught with tension. The Islamic Republic is a brutal dictatorship, and its legitimacy is fiercely contested by large segments of the Iranian population—particularly among younger generations. Yet, opposition to the regime remains bitterly fragmented, undermining its effectiveness. US policies have often further undermined the opposition, namely through sanctions. US sanctions have dealt great damage to Iran’s middle class, which has historically been a source of moderation and critical to the overall reform movement within the country. Ideologically divided and materially underequipped, the Iranian opposition has yet to coalesce into a coherent political force.
The current war should be viewed within this context of domestic and regional contestation. Operation Epic Fury is the culmination of decades of policy inertia and special interests pushing the United States and Iran toward confrontation. The series of blows to Iran’s strategic position in the more than two years since Hamas’ terror attack against Israel on October 7, 2023, Israel’s war in Gaza, and subsequent Israeli operations targeting Tehran’s regional partners and the Islamic Republic directly further accelerated this momentum. Both Israel and the United States hoped to capitalize on Tehran’s vulnerability and provided a host of fluid and often contradictory narratives to justify a pre-determined course of action.
One of these narratives was liberating the Iranian people. This narrative emerged following mass protests against the regime beginning in December 2025, spurred by a growing energy crisis inside Iran. Trump rhetorically embraced the protests—on at least eight occasions, he urged the Iranian people to continue their marches, claiming help was on the way. The regime ultimately crushed these protests via force by mid-January 2026. Trump seemingly hoped to rekindle them through war, telling the Iranian people, “Now is the time to seize control of your destiny, and to unleash the prosperous and glorious future that is close within your reach. This is the moment for action. Do not let it pass.”
There is considerable evidence that Trump hoped to eliminate Khamenei and replace him with a subservient authority, akin to what he did in Venezuela. Yet, after almost seven weeks of war, the United States and Israel have failed to effect regime change in Tehran. Despite assassinating Ayatollah Ali Khamenei within the first 24 hours of the war, the regime has not collapsed, nor does US intelligence believe it would collapse even if Washington escalated to a full-scale war. Given this reality, Trump has had to walk back his claim that he must “be involved” in selecting the next Supreme Leader to guarantee they are “reasonable to the United States.”
The domestic balance of power inside Tehran has now shifted firmly in favor of regime hardliners—they believe they are creating a new status quo between Tehran and Washington, and that this is only possible by maintaining pressure on the United States until the mounting political and economic costs force the United States to retreat. Instead of eliminating the regime, the war has empowered a new, more hawkish generation within its ranks—one that is far more likely to use even greater force if Iranians return to the streets following the war.
For the Islamic Republic, this fight has been existential. For the United States, it was a war of choice. Tactical victories did not translate into strategic successes, which explains the threats (partially carried out) to expand the war to systematically destroy civilian targets.
The long-term ramifications of this war remain unknown. But reality continues to cast doubt on the notion that Washington initiated this war to liberate the Iranian people—US Middle East policy remains rooted in continuity, not change. It should go without saying that the Iranians, like all people, deserve to live free and determine their own future. But by exploiting domestic opposition to the regime to justify this war, Washington merely uses them as political pawns.
The United States cannot manufacture a new status quo inside Iran—it must be self-sustaining and come from within, not externally imposed via war.