In full offensive against Iran, Israel feeds the idea of forcing the fall of the fundamentalist regime. But the history of external intervention in Afghanistan, Iraq and Libya is a warning to the risks of this strategy.
Three days after the start of the war against Iran, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu stated, in an interview with the US channel Fox News, that a “change of regime” in Tehran “can certainly be an outcome” of the action of Telavive forces there, as the government was “very weak.”
US President Donald Trump, on the other hand, sent contradictory signs, implying at times that he could act to eliminate the “Supreme Leader of Iran,” Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.
The longer the conflict between Israel and Iran lasts, the greater the temptation of Israel and the US of eliminating not only the Iranian nuclear program, but also the theocratic regime that has controlled Iran more than four decades.
The risks of attempts to “change the regime”
“It is highly doubtful that a regime change can be implemented from outside,” warns Eckart Woertz, director of the Middle East Studies Department at the German Institute of Global and Regional Studies (Giga), based in Hamburg. “And if she [a mudança de regime] It will have the desired direction is another completely different issue, ”he adds.
The expert warns, for example, to the risk of the revolutionary guard of Iran will take power, leading the regime to become even more aggressive. Or that the regime goes on total collapse, similar to what happened in Iraq after the US invasion in 2003 or Libya after the NATO campaign in 2011, generating unpredictable consequences for the region.
In general, the “change of regime” promoted by an external actor is a highly controversial concept. According to international law, it is a clear violation of the sovereignty of the state concerned.
Moreover, this measure is often not legitimized democratically and usually leads to a void of power or a phase of violence and instability. Often, newly installed governments cannot solve the country’s problems, which leads to more crises and conflicts.
In recent history, there have been several attempts to change regime through external military intervention – and the consequences of these interventions are still feeling today.
Afghanistan (2001)
Following the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001 in the US, the country’s allies in the NATO joined Washington to overthrow the fundamentalist Taliban regime in Afghanistan, which housed the al-Qaeda terrorist organization, responsible for the attack in New York.
The first successes were reached quickly and the Taliban were expelled from Cabul in late 2001. Subsequently, the alliance tried to establish democratic structures in Afghanistan. There are improvements, for example, in the rights of women and minorities, as well as in education and health. However, the NATO allies have disagreed in many issues, such as the way to combine military, political and development aid. Nor was there a plan on how traditional structures in the country could be properly considered during reconstruction.
Thus, security in the country remained extremely precarious for 20 years. In these two decades, Afghanistan was repeatedly the scene of conflicts, with the Talibans to launch regularly counter-affective. About 3,600 Western soldiers and almost 50 000 Afghan civilians were killed between 2001 and 2021. The total cost of the mission in Afghanistan exceeded a thousand million dollars.
During the chaotic US withdrawal in the summer of 2021, the Talibans quickly returned to power and almost all advances in the last 20 years have been reversed. Human rights violations, torture, extrajudicial murders and public executions continue to occur. The country remains isolated and extremely poor, with about 23 million people dependent on humanitarian aid.
In February 2024, the German Parliament Inquiry Commission (Bundestag) on European country’s military participation in Afghanistan took a disastrous balance: For 20 years, the Western coalition has not had a realistic strategy to build a stable state that could ensure its own safety.
Iraq (2003)
After a decade of punctual “police” sanctions and “police” actions against Saddam Hussein, the US decided to completely overthrow the bagity regime through a military invasion. The action, which had few allied countries, occurred without authorization from the UN Security Council.
To try to justify the invasion, President George W. Bush argued that the action was necessary because Saddam Hussein would have links with al-Qaeda, and have weapons of massive destruction-allegations that later proved false.
“Saddam Hussein was overthrown not because he had weapons of massive destruction, but precisely because he did not have them,” says two decades later the Middle East Eckart Woertz expert.
Initially, everything seemed to go well. After defeating Saddam’s troops, the Americans created a transitional government without participation of members of the Old Regime. But early the new rulers were accused of mismanagement and lack of knowledge of the country’s complexities.
Pre-existing hostilities between the different ethnic and religious groups of Iraq quickly became a civil war. Sunni Muslims began to kill Shiite Muslims and vice versa. The bloody attacks occurred daily. At the same time, after the dissolution of the Iraqi army, unemployed soldiers began attacking US occupation troops.
A decade later, in 2014, in the midst of the Void of Power, the Islamic State Terrorist Organization (IS) won vast areas of Iraq, imposing a terror regime, in which torture, systematic human rights violations and the mass murder of integer ethnic groups, such as the Yazidis, became a norm.
Twenty years after US invasion and attempted regime change, the situation in Iraq finally seems calmer. Violence has decreased and parliamentary elections are planned for November. Still, Iraq remains a transition country.
Libya (2011)
Libya also continues to suffer the consequences of an attempt to change regime with the participation of external actors. A civil war broke out in the country in 2011, following the Arab Spring, with protests against the government of dictator Muammar al-Gaddafi.
In power since 1969, Gaddafi tried to repress the popular revolt with extreme violence. Given the repression, the NATO intervened militarily, establishing a air exclusion zone to protect the civilian population who had been insurgent against the regime. The measure decisively weakened Gaddafi: it would eventually be murdered by insurgents on October 20, 2011, marking the end of its dictatorship of over four decades.
However, Libya’s different factions have never been able to establish an acceptable government throughout the country. Instead, the country was taken by new conflicts between rival militias, which continue to this day. The state has practically disintegrated, with two different governments fighting for territory control since March 2022.
In addition, several terrorist organizations are still active in the country today. Combatos occur constantly, with the involvement of foreign mercenaries. The human rights situation in the country is extremely precarious: without a functional state, there is abuse of refugees, hostage, torture and violence against women.
And the hypotheses of a regime change in Iran?
Given the history of Afghanistan, Iraq and Libya, it would be more cautious about a similar initiative in Iran. Expert Eckart Woertz sees an additional problem: in the end, some internal group would still have to act to force a change of government. “I don’t see a very strong rebellious movement within Iran that can overthrow the current regime,” he says.
What if this force comes from outside Iran?
“There was a change of successful regime in Germany at the end of World War II, but that required a land invasion,” says Woertz. “And a transition would still be needed in which the local population was grouped to support it. This can be facilitated if there is a common external enemy, such as the Soviet Union after 1945, which shorten differences. And a change of regime [bem-sucedida] It never happened only with air bombing, and I don’t think the will now be an exception. ”
