An American institute sees the need to change the Iranian regime: The matter is different from Iraq.

An American institute sees the need to change the Iranian regime: The matter is different from Iraq.

2025-07-10 04:22

Shafaq News – Special Translation
The American Providence Institute criticized the comparison between Iraq in 2003 and Iran in 2025, and the idea that “regime change” in Tehran would spark chaos and devolve into a quagmire and endless war, asserting that this theory is “distorted.”

The American Institute explained in a report translated by Shafaq News Agency that with Israel carrying out strikes on Iranian nuclear and military sites, talk of “regime change” has renewed, and critics have begun warning of “another Iraq, a chaotic quagmire, and a war without end.” However, this comparison is structurally “flawed,” as Iran is not Iraq.

The report considered that what turned post-Saddam Hussein Iraq into a “catastrophe” was not the regime change itself, but rather “Iran’s deliberate decision to make it so by flooding it with militias, hijacking its policies, and turning it into a proxy battlefield to expel US forces and consolidate its hegemony over the region.”

According to the American report, the idea of ​​repeating the same scenario in Iran ignores two important facts: first, that societal dynamics are completely different, and second, that no external force can do what Iran did to Iraq.

Therefore, the report says that regime change in Iran would eliminate the source of chaos, not unleash it.

The report continued that prior to the US invasion of Iraq in 2003, proponents of regime change considered Saddam Hussein’s regime a threat to international security, possessing weapons of mass destruction and capable of using them or transferring them to terrorist groups such as al-Qaeda.

Moreover, these same people believed that removing Saddam Hussein would not only contribute to liberating Iraqis from tyranny, but would also spark democracy throughout the Middle East.

Instead, the opposite happened, the report asserted, explaining that after the invasion, “Iraq descended into chaos, terrorism, and sectarian violence,” which reinforced the belief that regime change would inevitably lead to “catastrophe.”

However, the report stated that the truth is that the instability in Iraq after the invasion was not spontaneous, but rather the inevitable result of regime change. It indicated that this instability was largely caused by Iran, which quickly seized the “divine opportunity” to expand its influence, a long-held goal.

According to the report, immediately after the US invasion, the Iranian regime allocated an additional $26 million to the Revolutionary Guards’ Quds Force to arm Iraqi militias and infiltrate Iraqi politics, in an effort to transform Iraq into a key front on its regional agenda.

He pointed out that “former Quds Force commander Qassem Soleimani turned Iraq into a battleground for proxy wars, civil unrest, and foreign intervention, resulting in the deaths of thousands of Americans and Iraqis.”

The report noted that “Soleimani oversaw the establishment of weapons smuggling routes along the Iran-Iraq border, launched a calculated insurgency against US forces through proxy militias, and participated in sectarian warfare, allowing Iran to formulate policies that advance its interests while limiting the influence of the United States and potential regional rivals such as Saudi Arabia.”

However, the report acknowledged that Iranian influence alone does not explain Iraq’s disintegration, as the mission’s failure was also rooted in a lack of coherent planning and flawed execution by the United States and its allies. It added that the disastrous mistakes made by the US government, along with intelligence failures, reflected a significant miscalculation of post-war realities.

In this context, the report cited what it called the “misguided dismantling” of Iraqi institutions, the sweeping de-Baathification, the destruction of state capacity, and the prioritization of short-term political gains over building genuine institutions. This created a vacuum that paved the way for the outbreak of post-war chaos and contributed to long-term instability, including the rise of ISIS.

The report considered that past mistakes were the result of a flawed implementation, not because the goals themselves were illegitimate.

In addition, the report stated that the comparison between Iraq and Iran ignores fundamental differences in political culture, social cohesion, and ethnic integration between the two countries. It explained that, unlike Iraq before the US invasion, contemporary Iran has witnessed a flourishing of civil society groups, as evidenced by prominent protest movements, such as the 2009 Green Movement, the environmental movement, and ongoing activism in the field of human and women’s rights, along with a flourishing public and intellectual discourse on sensitive social and political issues, such as the relationship between religion and state, the role of civil society, and the future ideological orientation of Iran.

The report continued, stating that although there are separatist elements among Iran’s minorities (Kurds, Arabs, Baluchis, and Azeris), these elements are not sufficiently organized or popular to pose a serious threat to national cohesion. It added that, given the civic consciousness of Iranian society and the non-separatist outlook of non-Persian communities, the spread of chaos following any potential regime change seems highly unlikely.

The report concluded by stating that using the failed example of regime change in Iraq as evidence that regime change should never be attempted again is a grave mistake, and will only embolden the regime in Tehran, allowing it to continue its domestic repression and destabilizing policies in the region.

shafaq.com