Trump Revives Iran Regime Change Call As Diplomacy Collapses

US President Donald Trump has returned to openly floating regime change in Iran, calling on Iranians to challenge their government as diplomatic efforts remain stalled and the conflict enters another period of escalation.

Trump asked on social media on Tuesday, “When are the Iranian people going to rise up and fight?”, reviving an idea he had pushed at the beginning of the war but later sought to distance himself from.

At the start of the conflict in late February, Trump had urged Iranians to seize what he described as their opportunity to bring about a government takeover. The idea soon receded as the US administration shifted towards negotiations with Tehran, particularly over reopening the Strait of Hormuz.

By June, Trump said he had “never cared about regime change” and argued that US attempts to remove foreign governments had historically failed. He said Washington was instead negotiating with what he described as rational figures in Iran.

Diplomacy Stalls

That diplomatic track has now largely broken down.

CNN reported that there are currently no substantive efforts to resume negotiations after Trump ordered his envoys to halt discussions with Iran last month. Traffic through the Strait of Hormuz remains below pre-war levels, while the renewed military confrontation has further narrowed the space for diplomacy.

The US and Iran exchanged strikes over three consecutive days this week, breaking a month-long period of relative calm. Trump said Wednesday that Washington was prepared to launch another major attack if necessary, although he also indicated that he did not expect the renewed fighting to continue for long.

Trump has presented the current US position as favourable, saying Washington has near-total control of the Strait of Hormuz and that Iran’s economy is collapsing.

What Trump Wants

The renewed regime-change rhetoric reflects an objective Trump had raised even before the war began.

According to CNN, Trump had been asking his national security team for months why the Iranian people had not moved to overthrow their leaders. He had initially expected intense US and Israeli strikes to trigger street protests in Tehran, an expectation that was disputed by other US officials based on intelligence assessments.

Those protests have not produced a change in Iran’s leadership. Instead, Iranian authorities have responded to unrest with severe crackdowns.

Trump has also been unwilling to say whether the US might support Iranian dissidents seeking to overthrow the government. Asked this week whether Washington, potentially through the CIA, would arm such groups, he declined to provide details, saying it would not be appropriate to discuss them.

A Longer War

The renewed focus on regime change comes six months into a war that has repeatedly shifted between military escalation and attempts at diplomacy.

CNN reported that officials close to Trump would prefer the conflict to recede from the political spotlight ahead of the US midterm elections. The renewed fighting, however, has once again brought Iran to the centre of US foreign policy.

Trump has continued to link economic pressure, military action and the possibility of internal unrest in Iran, while Tehran has shown little indication that the pressure alone will lead to the political change Washington initially anticipated.

For now, the US position appears to combine continuing military pressure with economic measures, while the diplomatic channel remains stalled. Trump’s renewed appeals for Iranians to rise against their government have brought regime change back into the public discussion, even after he had previously said it was not his objective.