Fardin

Vice President Vance is right. President Trump should not be installing Ghalibaf or any other regime insider. The United States has repeatedly searched for a “manageable Iranian” rather than trying to understand Iranian society itself. In 1979, many Western policymakers convinced themselves that Khomeini could be a stabilizing figure who would prevent chaos and protect Western interests. Today, some analysts make a similar argument about regime insiders who they believe can preserve order while normalizing relations with the West. History suggests that assumption is often wrong. Declassified records show Washington repeatedly sought channels to whichever faction appeared capable of maintaining stability, even when it misunderstood the forces actually driving Iranian politics. But the harder question is what is wrong with us internally? I would argue three things. First, Iran has suffered from a chronic shortage of independent institutions. When institutions are weak, politics becomes a search for saviors, strongmen, clerics, generals, or foreign patrons. The same cycle repeats because power is concentrated in personalities rather than durable national institutions. Historians of the revolution often point to the long-standing gap between state and society as a recurring problem in modern Iranian history. Second, Iranians have repeatedly outsourced hope. One generation hoped the clergy would save Iran. Another hoped reformists would save Iran. Others hoped foreign powers would save Iran. The result is that political energy often gets invested in factions and personalities. We need to focus on personal responsibility. Third, Iran’s opposition movement is still in its infancy. Only recently has it coalesced around a nationally recognized leader in Reza Pahlavi, whose support became visible as millions of Iranians took to the streets chanting his name. Building a serious political movement takes time. Institutions, fundraising networks, communications infrastructure, leadership cadres, and organizational capacity do not emerge overnight—especially under a system that has spent decades imprisoning, exiling, and killing its opponents. From Washington’s perspective, this creates a recurring temptation: deal with the people who already control the guns, bureaucracy, intelligence services, and money. Whether that calculation is morally right or strategically wise is another question. The tragedy is that Iran’s modern history is full of moments where foreign governments misread Iran, but it is also full of moments where Iranian elites misread Iran. In 1979, many “secular” intellectuals believed they could ride Khomeini’s movement and control it afterward. They were wrong. Today, anyone who believes this security oligarchy will simply transform itself into a democratic order that respects the rule of law, abides by international norms, and becomes a responsible member of the international community is seriously mistaken. America often gets Iran wrong because it prioritizes stability over understanding. One of Iran’s enduring challenges has been the failure to build independent institutions capable of preventing power from being monopolized by a deeply entrenched, centuries-old Shi’a clerical power structure. The Shah recognized this problem and attempted to build modern state institutions that could serve as a counterweight to traditional clerical authority, but he was only partially successful and simply did not have enough time. The clerical establishment retained deep social, financial, and organizational roots that ultimately enabled it to reassert itself and capture the state after 1979. When these two structural realities collide—-foreign powers repeatedly misreading Iran while Iranians are denied the opportunity, often through brutal repression and mass violence, to build institutions capable of constraining a deeply entrenched clerical power structure, it is the Iranian people who ultimately pay the price.