The help that US President Donald Trump had promised to Iranians has arrived. The United States and Israel have crossed the threshold from warning to action. Ali Khamenei, the Islamist who legitimized the massacre of thousands of Iranians, is dead.
This moment is not merely a military escalation: it is a strategic inflection point. But achieving a stable and lasting outcome requires strategic clarity.
That clarity matters now because the regime’s eventual move is predictable: it will manufacture an “acceptable” successor arrangement – packaged as reform – in order to preserve the IRGC-centered regime. If Washington wavers or treats regime-managed succession as moderation, it will rescue the regime at its moment of maximum vulnerability. The regime will be re-legitimized, and the strikes will have produced neither freedom for Iranians nor security for the region – only a refreshed version of the same regime.
This is the familiar cycle Washington has enabled for decades: approaching the Islamic Republic as something that could be moderated, managed, or incentivized into normal state behavior. Trump’s Iran policy is a break from that pattern, and it should be sustained. For the first time, Washington is aligning its posture with the idea of regime change.
The reformist trap: continuity after decapitation
One trap must be avoided: mistaking the removal of the regime’s unifying symbol for the collapse of its governing machine. Ali Khamenei functioned less as the system’s day-to-day operator and more as its central seal of unity – an authority figure around whom rival factions, security organs, and patronage networks could rally.
With that symbol gone, the regime’s ideological core does not disappear: it disperses into the factions and actors who have long run the apparatus of repression domestically and terrorism globally. The IRGC remains – and the question becomes which hardline faction takes over.
The regime will eventually try to rebrand continuity as reform. It will attempt to fast-track a “national unity” successor through IRGC power bargaining, elevate familiar diplomatic faces as “reasonable” interlocutors, and offer social easing – selective prisoner releases and looser enforcement in a few cities – to shape the narrative while the ideological core and repressive machine remain intact.
The rebranded regime will tease “constitutional review” committees that never touch the IRGC’s economic empire or its parallel security state, scapegoat a faction to imply change, and then tighten control – shutdowns, curfews, and “anti-chaos” messaging – to reassert dominance. Washington must treat these signals for what they are: a rebranding of the same regime.
Trump’s coercive Iran policy is what differentiates him from Obama and Biden, who negotiated with and normalized a regime that commits mass atrocities both at home and in the region.
This is exactly why Washington must not swerve into diplomacy with familiar “reformist” faces marketed as an alternative. Figures such as Ali Larijani, Abbas Araghchi, Hassan Rouhani, and Javad Zarif are not a bridge to democracy or even behavioral change for the regime. They are shaped by the regime’s governing system – and enable it. These figures are inseparably embedded in the regime’s decision-making ecosystem and are historically intertwined with its security structures – notably the IRGC.
Negotiating with them, especially in any outcome that stops short of regime change, does not deliver regional security. It results in regime continuity under a rebranding that preserves the core ideological and power structures. A stable region and a free Iran require a genuine political break, not a rotation of familiar regime enablers.
Recognition is the operational necessity
When the regime’s survival strategy is rebranding, the counter-strategy is to remove ambiguity about the alternative. Raza Pahlavi has been the name chanted by millions during the 2026 uprising. He has a proven leadership capacity to mobilize inside Iran and in the diaspora. Pahlavi’s Emergency Phase Booklet is his comprehensive, expert-oriented plan for after the regime’s collapse.
Minutes after the initial strikes, Pahlavi issued a video statement, declaring the moment a turning point and directing the Iranian nation to await his call to mobilize, remaining alert and ready for the final battle. This pairing of external coercion and internal mobilization is necessary for regime change – and must be operationalized with precision.
In revolutionary moments, ambiguity prolongs conflict, while recognition shortens it. It is not symbolic – it is operational. It signals to regime institutions, security forces, and officials that there is a defined political destination beyond the current system. It shapes expectations, influences decision-making within the regime, and can accelerate defections and internal unraveling.
This leads to the single most urgent policy step Washington and Jerusalem must take now: Recognize Crown Prince Reza Pahlavi’s transitional government. Not consider, not monitor: recognize.
Strategic clarity for political end-state: regime change
If Washington and Jerusalem want this moment to result in a free Iran that is aligned with international norms – not simply another cycle of temporary containment – they must act with clarity:
1. Avoid legitimizing regime continuity. This includes both formal negotiations and informal channels that elevate figures tied to the existing power structure. Securitized figures such as Larijani, Araghchi, Rouhani, and Zarif have a track record of hostility to American and Israeli interests. They are enablers of the IRGC and cannot be trusted in any capacity.
2. Make regime change the political end state. Ambiguity between reform and regime change undermines every other policy decision. Washington’s policy must focus on regime change for a real, tangible transformation – a transition led by the regime’s consequential opposition that can be trusted by Americans and Israelis alike.
Pahlavi is politically legible to Iranians and operationally legible to Washington. For the final internal takeover by the Iranian nation, coordinate timing, communications, and contingency planning with Pahlavi to have internal mobilization at the right moment.
3. Provide direct logistical support to the Iranian nation. Once internal mobilization starts, communication access should be supported when the regime pulls the plug, so that the Iranian uprising can organize and endure.
A free Iran through alignment with the Iranian nation
Even at the regime’s weakest point, Trump should avoid a return to the familiar pattern of one more round of talks; one more attempt to engage “moderates,” as Obama did; or one more deferral of the underlying issue, which is the regime in its entirety. That approach has defined the past – and has consistently failed Americans, allies, and the Iranian nation.
The approach that will secure long-term peace regionally and safeguard American and allied interests is alignment with the Iranian nation to deliver the ultimate blow: the takeover of government and a transition under Pahlavi’s leadership.
The author holds a PhD in international relations from Queen’s University.