This analysis argues decapitation won’t solve U.S. Iran problem. Historical record shows removing leaders rarely changes systems. Leaders are products of entrenched networks. Iran may persist with nuclear drive or descend into chaos. The hard work—shaping political outcomes—is just beginning.
When Iranians took to the streets to celebrate the death of Ayatollah Ali Khamenei on February 28, it was tempting to think that the hardest part of the current confrontation with Iran was over. Iran has been a wicked policy problem for the United States, its Middle Eastern allies, and the international community for decades, and Khamenei was more than merely the face of the problem. He was a bitter voice of opposition, a hard-liner who persistently undermined moderates, and in control of all of the most threatening elements of Iranian power: its nuclear program, its paramilitary forces, its proxy network, and the intelligence services that both terrorized Iranians and carried out acts of terror around the world.
The United States and Israel were able to use exquisite intelligence and powerful munitions not only to kill Khamenei at the outset of the war, but also to kill many of his most senior advisers. Decapitating the regime seems to offer a tidy way to “solve” a problem that has resisted solution for almost half a century, and it could unfold along several paths. The new leaders who arise could adopt a wholly different posture toward the world. They could be incompetent in implementing Khamenei’s strategy. Or they could decide that self-preservation requires them to be more pliable in the face of U.S. demands. It is not unreasonable to think that any of Khamenei’s successors would be an improvement.
Historical Record on Decapitation
Unfortunately, though, meaningful improvement through decapitation is unlikely. Each situation is unique, and each involves an element of chance. Still, the track record for advancing ambitious political goals—which is what the United States has—through a limited military effort is poor. The most common outcome of external military intervention is instability or civil war; in some cases, new strongmen replace the old ones. While the fall of dictators certainly presents moments of euphoria, deeply networked people with money and guns (and few scruples) often triumph after periods of chaos. Even when the near term looks promising, the medium term often proves less so.
Consider, for example, Israel’s repeated decapitation of Hamas. Since Hamas was founded in 1987, Israel has assassinated—or attempted to assassinate—a long line of Hamas leaders, including Hamas founder Ahmed Yassin (2004) and former Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh (2024), while attempts against Khaled Mashal (1997) and Khalil al-Hayya (2025) failed. One could argue that these assassinations were punishment or deserved. However, what is much harder to argue is that these assassinations have either changed the direction of the Hamas leadership or done much to blunt the broader political ambitions of Hamas narrowly or the Palestinian national movement more broadly. Hamas, as a political movement, absorbed its martyrs and lives to fight another day.
Of course, the story is not all so gloomy. Japan and Germany emerged from World War II with new leadership and close partnerships with the United States that have grown stronger in the subsequent eight decades. Panama has flourished after the 1989 removal of dictator Manuel Noriega for his drug-running efforts, and democracy has been strengthened.
Iran’s Own History with Regime Change
A more mixed story can be found in Iran itself. As every Iranian knows, the United States and the United Kingdom worked together to overthrow Prime Minister Mohammad Mossadegh in 1953 after he nationalized the oil industry and partnered with the local communist party. The move allowed the Shah, Mohammad Reza Pahlavi, to rule unencumbered for a quarter-century. Fiercely anti-communist and close to the West, Iran stood as one of the “Twin Pillars” of Western strategy in the Persian Gulf, alongside Saudi Arabia. Between the two, they kept the region’s oil supplies firmly in the Western camp and far away from the Soviet Union. The Shah’s modernization efforts played well in Washington, and his close ties with Israel won Iran some friends; the Shah’s authoritarianism was easy for many to overlook.
For the most dangerous part of the Cold War, then, the U.S. effort to remove what it saw as a dangerous leader was a success. The problem from a U.S. perspective was the almost-half-century that followed his fall. Since its establishment in 1979, the Islamic Republic has presented an enduring threat to U.S. allies and partners in the Middle East, and it has harbored a special animus against the United States.
Iraq as a Cautionary Tale
Neighboring Iraq is a harder case to judge. Saddam Hussein was certainly a malign force in both Iraq and the region, but it is Iran that benefited most when the United States removed him from power. The prevailing view in the Bush administration was that if the “dirty dozen” at the top of the Iraqi government were removed, the Iraqi people would be in control of their fate after decades of brutal dictatorship. Great effort and planning went into the military campaign, and politics were something of an afterthought.
Yet every Iraqi government since the fall of Saddam has understood the depth of Iranian penetration of their country, its security apparatus, its economy, and its politics. The indelible images of Iraqis proudly holding their ink-stained fingers aloft after voting in 2005 were moving, but they were followed by a brutal insurgency that allowed Iran to penetrate further still. Iranian-backed militias hold wide swaths of the country in their grip, and every Iraqi prime minister has known he needs to strike a modus vivendi with Iran. In addition, the United States built on Saddam’s strategy to use heightened sectarianism as a tool of Iraqi political management. That strategy provided short-term stabilization, but it reinforced the country’s fault lines. For all of the blood and treasure that the United States poured into Iraq after decapitating the government, the scoreboard is decidedly mixed.
Why Systems Survive Leaders
Elsewhere, the direct U.S. effort was less clear, and the outcomes remain murky. One set of arguable successes was in Eastern Europe. Although the United States’ role in precipitating the fall of the Iron Curtain was anything but acute, strong support to Eastern Europe—from the United States and European allies alike—helped many countries transition (back) to democracy after decades of authoritarian rule. The United States moved Jean-Bertrand Aristide out (and then in, and then out) of power in the 1990s and 2000s, and Haiti has become steadily less secure and more dysfunctional. Libyan dictator Muammar Gaddafi maintained an iron grip on his country. Since his fall in 2011, a power vacuum has persisted, and warring factions roam the country. Shortly thereafter, the United States helped ease Ali Abdullah Saleh out of power in Yemen, and chaos has followed in his wake.
Little of this was by design, but it reveals an important truth: Efforts to change systems of government are destabilizing. Too often, the “great man” theory of history persists, fostering the belief that removing a single person can cause complex problems to disappear. But leaders do not rule by themselves. They are the product of systems that are attuned to local circumstances, and they preside over elaborate patronage networks whose members have everything to lose. Removing a leader often exposes the pathologies of a country that was struggling. By virtue of being close to power, groups often acquire money, guns, and networks. When there is any vacuum, they deploy them to remain in power.
For example, in country after country in the Arab Spring, security services aligned with business elites to form some new version of the ancien régime. In those places where new elites came to the fore, they either made peace with existing elements or created similar structures with themselves in charge.
What Successful Political Transitions Require
Compare this to Syria. Ahmed al-Sharaa in Syria built his rump state in Idlib province for eight years before moving into Damascus. In Idlib, he and his team created an entire governmental network that built popular support, as well as a track record of success. That is to say, al-Sharaa had the time and space (and money) to build resilient institutions. Officials who were competent could be promoted, and the incompetent shunted aside. Large and loyal cadres were built, and discipline was instilled.
That way, when he moved to take over the government in Damascus in December 2024, he was able to draw on his existing apparatus. This network is accustomed to working together, can create and implement policies, and knows how to build support. While the future of Syria remains murky, early signs suggest the new government is internally coherent and has won significant public backing.
Decapitation short-circuits that sort of process and does not allow resilient alternatives to emerge. Often, after decapitation, either some version of the current government remains in power, or countries dissolve into chaos. In an extensive survey of regime change efforts over the last two centuries, political scientist Alexander B. Downes found that “more than 40 percent of states that experience foreign-imposed regime change have a civil war within the next ten years.” He argued in his book that, paradoxically, “regime change is likely to result in unfavorable outcomes where it is easy and better outcomes where it is hard.”
How Iran May Go
Some argue that this argument is irrelevant for Iran. After what is expected to be an onslaught in the coming weeks, any Iranian government—even a continuation of the present one—would decide it is suicidal to pursue the country’s nuclear and ballistic missile programs. In that way, an acute danger to Israel and the United States will evaporate, and the war will be considered a success.
But there are many ways that would not be the outcome. After all, for the current government, the attack validates their belief in the unrelenting hostility of the United States and Israel. An important part of deterrence is assurance: If a target refrains from proscribed behavior, threatened punishments will not follow. Iran’s leaders have often concluded that U.S. hostility to Iran has meant that the ratchet only goes one way, and the only consequence of Iranian concessions is demands that Iran make more concessions, albeit from a position of greater weakness.
For many in the current regime, the war underlines Iran’s vital need to maintain its own deterrent. What shape that would take is unclear, but it is likely to emphasize asymmetrical tools that can cause serious damage. That could involve enduring threats to neighbors, to Israel, and to the United States. Iranian colleagues often remark that countries that have crossed the nuclear threshold—Pakistan, India, and North Korea—have never been attacked by Western powers, and the Iranian drive for nuclear weapons may well persist.
Should the government fall, a replacement government may have difficulty maintaining control. This would be especially true if devastating attacks on energy infrastructure created enduring economic distress. The new government would have little ability to relieve suffering and few tools to build patronage. As the central authority dissolved, ungoverned spaces could emerge that provided cover for armed groups to operate, including recidivist elements of the current government. That chaos could well spread outward for many years to come. It is unlikely that any country would seek to occupy Iran, a country more than twice the size of Texas, with a population three times the size of Iraq. Iran could simply smolder.
From Israel’s point of view, those sorts of scenarios may be an improvement on the status quo. Feeling an existential threat from Iran’s nuclear program and a persistent danger from Iran’s proxies, many Israelis would see even a chaotic situation in Iran as favorable. Israel believes it is already locked into an enduring battle with Iran, so its continuation, even on different terms, is an acceptable outcome.
Diverging U.S. and Israeli Stakes
The United States has more complicated interests. It has much more extensive relationships in Iran’s immediate neighborhood, and a much more robust presence there. Persistent and evolving threats to the United States and its partners would heighten dangers to Americans present in the region, jeopardize growing economic investments, and have enduring negative effects on global trade. Simply put, the United States has not needed to feel it was on a constant war footing with Iran, but it may need to going forward.
The assassination of Ayatollah Khamenei was not the hard part of the current campaign. Deploying intelligence tools and military instruments against an adversary is something that U.S. and Israeli forces have done with great success for decades. What is harder is using those tools to shape political outcomes, and in particular, to shape the political choices that Iran’s leaders—and its future leaders—make. While President Donald Trump has sometimes spoken about his desire for regime change and the freedom of the Iranian people, those things are hard to accomplish, and even harder to do from arm’s length and with little preparation. The record of decapitation creating much more favorable governments is generally poor.
More likely, the U.S. and Israeli governments hope that future leaders of Iran will see that resistance is futile, and they will simply submit to the aggressors’ strength and will. Here, too, the record is not encouraging. Khamenei was 86 and ailing, and succession talk was swirling. That may have been an opportunity to help Iran move in a different direction, but that moment has passed.
Conclusion
The current war presents a much more acute challenge, and one where favorable outcomes will be much harder to secure. Much will depend on how the war unfolds and what is damaged in the process. The spectrum of possibilities is wide. But experience teaches that fighting the war successfully is a small part of achieving war aims. That is especially true here, where so many of the war aims seem to be political.
Almost 60 years ago, the development economist Albert O. Hirschman wrote about the “hiding hand.” That is, individuals systematically underestimate the difficulty of what they hope to do while also underestimating the creativity that unexpected difficulties will demand. The U.S. and Israeli governments have vast power to destroy, but far less capacity to build—especially in foreign lands that they have just vanquished. They should understand that the hard work is just beginning. Killing the Iranian leadership is not the goal of this operation. Changing the political decisions of future Iranian leaders is. That is the challenge, and it will be harder than they expect. It will require more creativity—and effort—than they seem ready to deploy.