Iran after Ayatollah Ali Khamenei |
For years, interventionists in the West made the argument that the long-term costs of the political order in Iran, such as repression, economic decay, and social stagnation, outweighed the risks of a violent external regime change. Last month, the “moral barrier” to intervention was significantly lowered by the bloody crackdown on protests in January and the extensive positive coverage of the Iranian opposition in Western media.
The US-Israeli intervention came soon after, with both United States President Donald Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu urging Iranians to “rise up”. The assassinations of Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and other high-level Iranian officials were celebrated as a major achievement.
However, the assumption that the removal of a central figurehead will lead to a “short and decisive rupture” followed by a smooth transition is far from certain. In fact, Iran after Ayatollah Khamenei may not be at all what the proponents of intervention desire to see.
Regime change gone wrong
The wider Middle East has three recent examples of why outside intervention is unlikely to result in a smooth transition and stability. Afghanistan, Iraq and Libya demonstrate that external military operations are followed not by rapid stabilisation, but by chaos. That much is apparent from a quick look at the scores of these countries on the Worldwide Governance Indicators of the World Bank.
Afghanistan experienced regime change in 2001 following the US invasion; that triggered two decades of fighting and attacks on civilians. In 2021, the country saw the return of the ousted regime, but stability remains elusive.
Iraq has seen various insurgencies and civil war following the US invasion in 2003; despite democratisation efforts, the country is still unable to return to pre-2003 stability.
Libya’s collapse following a NATO-led intervention in 2011 saw the country drop from positive stability scores in the Worldwide Governance Indicators to some of the lowest in the world, with no recovery in sight. The country remains split between two centres of governance – in Tripoli and Benghazi.
None of these countries have regained their pre-intervention stability levels.........