- Share via
On Sunday at approximately 2 a.m. Tehran time, seven B-2 stealth aircraft attacked the Iranian nuclear facilities in Fordo, Natanz and Isfahan, strikes enabled as much by the belief that Iran had this coming as the particular technology of the American bombers. A drawling President Trump put it in stark terms shortly after the operation ended. “For 40 years, Iran has been saying death to America, death to Israel. They have been killing our people, blowing off their arms, blowing off their legs, with roadside bombs. That was their specialty.”
Convention drives coverage of Iran in the United States, from stock images of anti-American murals to the enduring menace of “Iranian-backed militias.” Now there is an emerging consensus that overthrowing the government in Tehran will accomplish what Israeli and U.S. missiles and air assaults have not: an end to Iran’s nuclear program and that country’s destabilizing aspirations for regional hegemony, not to mention an end of the oppressive Islamic Republic itself. A series of headlines, analysts and politicians have in recent days presented regime change as a natural certainty, nothing less than a magic bullet. This too is seen as Iran’s due.
U.S. military officials said its precision strikes against Iran’s three main nuclear facilities caused “extremely severe damage and destruction.”
Very few of these expert voices have taken the next step by asking, “Then what?” Where does the magic bullet land? Sovereign imperatives await the next group to come into power. Democratic or otherwise, the government that replaces the current regime will be laser-focused on Iran’s survival. And there is very little reason for Israel or the U.S. to think that a reconstituted Iran will become more conciliatory toward either country once the war ends.
The reality is that nationalism, not theocracy, remains what what the historian Ali Ansari calls the “determining ideology” of Iran. There is a robust consensus among scholars that politics in Iran begins with the idea of Iran as a people with a continuous and unbroken history, a nation that “looms out of an immemorial past.” Nationalism provides the broad political arena in which different groups and ideologies in Iran compete for power and authority, whether monarchist, Islamist or leftist.
And that means that the patriotic defense of Iran isn’t a passing phase, produced under the duress of bombs, but the default position, the big idea that holds Iran together, hardened over the last two centuries of Iranian history and the trauma of the loss of territory and dignity to outside powers, including the Russians, the British and the Americans.
Iranian Americans are grappling with revulsion for the government in Tehran and concern that the war could have deadly consequences for civilians in Iran.
Getting rid of Islamic rule won’t change this dynamic; it is almost sure to guarantee that something worse will come along, sending Iranian politics in unexpected and more corrosive directions. Americans, after all, need only look to their current administration (or past interventions in the Middle East) for examples of how populist responses to foreign invasions, real or imagined, can lead to unthinkable outcomes.
“Trump just guaranteed that Iran will be a nuclear weapons state in the next 5 to 10 years, particularly if the regime changes,” Trita Parsi of the U.S.-based Quincy Institute wrote Saturday night. This is especially true if a new regime is democratic. The promised “liberation” of the Iranian people through devastating bombing campaigns presents the worst-case scenario for Israel and the U.S., as no future elected government would survive unless it sustained, and perhaps surpassed, the Islamic Republic of Iran’s current belligerence.
There is tragedy here. Ordinary Iranians, like most people, want peace and security, preferably through diplomacy and dialogue. The unprovoked attacks of the last week and their subsequent justification by not only the U.S. but also nearly all of the European Union, a disastrous sequence that began with Trump’s wanton violation of President Obama’s Iran deal in 2018, have convinced an increasing number of Iranians that the restraint of arms, nuclear or otherwise, is national suicide.
Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth says the United States ‘does not seek war’ with Iran in the aftermath of a surprise attack overnight on three of that country’s nuclear sites.
Insofar as the Islamic Republic can claim that it is the only Iranian government in more than 200 years to have lost “not an inch of soil,” it continues to cling to power. Of course, such legitimacy comes with a dual edge. This regime may survive in the short term, but if and when it does fall it will be because its leaders failed to keep Israeli and American arms out, munitions that have already killed more than 800 of their fellow citizens in less than a week, according to the Washington-based group Human Rights Activists.
One of the most common conventions when it comes to Iran, typically presented as a gesture of grace, is to draw a distinction between its government and the people, to lay blame on “the mullahs” and not the country’s long-suffering citizens for their country’s status as a rogue actor. As a way to appeal to Iranians of the righteousness of his cause, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his surrogates have deployed tropes of civilizational greatness that would make even the most ardent Persian chauvinist blush. On Thursday, the Israeli prime minister announced that the time had come for the Jews to repay an ancient debt: “I want to tell you that 2,500 years ago, Cyrus the Great, the king of Persia, liberated the Jews. And today, a Jewish state is creating the means to liberate the Persian people.” Regime change, by this logic, is a project of recovery and revivalism, a surefire way to make Iran great again.
Isfahan, one of three cities targeted in American military strikes, is home to a UNESCO World Heritage Site and a mosque that dates to the year 841.
Iranians are proving to be less nuanced, and unconvinced. The distance between the Iranian state and society has in the last week been reduced to almost nothing. Across the range of experience and suffering, from imprisoned Nobel Peace Prize laureates and formerly imprisoned Palm D’Or winners to working-class laborers left behind by the revolution, the overriding sentiment today in Iran is clear: These clerics may be scoundrels, but they’re our scoundrels, our problem to solve.
Nearly 50 years into an unwanted dictatorship, Iranians have developed a refined capacity for identifying bad faith. They know who has Iran’s interests at heart and who is trying to save his own skin.
Iranian American Shervin Malekzadeh is a visiting assistant professor of political science at Pitzer College and author of the forthcoming book, “Fire Beneath the Ash: The Green Movement and the Struggle for Democracy in Iran, 2009-2019.”
Insights
L.A. Times Insights delivers AI-generated analysis on Voices content to offer all points of view. Insights does not appear on any news articles.
Viewpoint
Perspectives
The following AI-generated content is powered by Perplexity. The Los Angeles Times editorial staff does not create or edit the content.
Ideas expressed in the piece
Shervin Malekzadeh argues that U.S. military strikes on Iran’s nuclear facilities, including Fordow, Natanz, and Isfahan, will fail to eliminate Iran’s nuclear ambitions. The author contends that nationalism—not theocracy—forms Iran’s core ideology, ensuring any future government will prioritize national survival and likely adopt more hardline policies than the current regime. He asserts that regime change, often promoted as a solution, would backfire by accelerating Iran’s pursuit of nuclear weapons. Malekzadeh emphasizes that external attacks have solidified domestic unity, with Iranians viewing the government as a necessary shield against foreign aggression despite their discontent. He criticizes the U.S.-Israeli narrative distinguishing “the people” from “the regime,” noting that wartime solidarity has erased this dichotomy. Ultimately, the article warns that bombing Iran guarantees nuclear proliferation within 5–10 years and ignores the historical trauma driving Iranian nationalism.
Different views on the topic
- U.S. and Israeli strikes have inflicted “extreme damage” on Iranian nuclear sites like Fordow, setting back Iran’s program by years according to senior officials[1]. These operations deployed specialized bunker-busting munitions to degrade enrichment capabilities, reflecting a tactical success in delaying nuclear progress[1][4].
- International agencies confirm Iran’s noncompliance with nuclear safeguards, including undeclared uranium traces and stockpiles sufficient for 10 weapons within weeks[2][3]. This breach justifies preemptive action to prevent proliferation, as diplomatic efforts repeatedly failed[2][3].
- Strikes align with broader objectives to dismantle Iran’s destabilizing activities, including support for militant proxies—a pattern described by President Trump as justifying military response[1][3].
- European powers and international bodies have endorsed defensive actions against Iran’s nuclear advancements, contrasting the article’s claim of unilateral aggression[3]. The IAEA explicitly criticized Iran’s safeguards violations prior to the attacks[2][3].
- Technological resilience is overstated: IAEA reports confirm severe infrastructure damage at Natanz and Isfahan, undermining Iran’s capacity for rapid nuclear reconstitution[3][4].
A cure for the common opinion
Get thought-provoking perspectives with our weekly newsletter.
You may occasionally receive promotional content from the Los Angeles Times.
More From the Los Angeles Times
Podcasts
In this episode, we discuss the history here, what lessons were learned — and not — and how that can inform what we we do this time around as we attempt to rebuild Altadena and the Pacific Palisades.
Alexis Linkletter & Madison McGhee unpack the chaotic Justin Baldoni vs. Blake Lively lawsuit, separating fact from fiction, and its career impact.
Sammy Roth visits Ioneer’s proposed Rhyolite Ridge mine in Nevada with managing director Bernard Rowe, who details responsible lithium/boron extraction and Tiehm’s buckwheat protection.
