January 2026 will be remembered not only for the scale of the uprising in Iran, but for the clarity it produced. In a matter of weeks, illusions that had lingered for decades collapsed. About the people. About the regime. About fake alternatives. And about the idea that Iran would somehow be “saved” from the outside.

What unfolded across the country was not noise. It was a verdict.

1. A people who chose the point of no return

The first truth was written in blood. This uprising was not about reform. It was not about pressure or negotiation. It was about ending the regime. According to the National Council of Resistance of Iran, more than 3,000 protesters were killed and over 50,000 were imprisoned in the early weeks alone. Yet the streets did not empty.

People came back knowing the cost. Live ammunition. Mass arrests. Torture. Execution threats. Societies do not absorb this level of pain unless they have crossed a line. January 2026 showed that fear no longer governs Iran. The people have decided that the price of survival under the regime is higher than the price of resistance.

2. This was not chaos. It was resistance

The second truth was organizational. Protests erupted simultaneously across distant provinces. Regime symbols were targeted deliberately. After each crackdown, demonstrations resurfaced with coordination intact. This was not spontaneous rage. It was structured resistance operating under extreme repression.

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The regime understood this immediately. That is why it responded with such savagery. Dictators can tolerate anger. They cannot tolerate organization. January shattered the myth of a fragmented society waiting for a savior.

3. The exposure of political smoke screens

The uprising also exposed manufactured alternatives. As events escalated, Reza Pahlavi’s role became impossible to ignore. His messaging swung between vague calls for unity and appeals for foreign intervention. He even claimed that 5,000 IRGC members had joined him. That claim evaporated. No evidence. No defections. No impact.

More revealing was the reaction of his backers. At the decisive moment, they openly warned against regime collapse and opposed regime change. This was not a mistake. It was the purpose of the project. Confuse the public. Delay momentum. Manage the crisis. Save the system.

When the regime was truly threatened, the smoke cleared.

4. A different logic takes shape

January 2026 also clarified something outside Iran. The United States did not choose war. It did not return to appeasement. Under President Trump, it gravitated toward a third option. Refusing to rescue the regime.

This was not hesitation. It was a change in logic. Decades of bombing threats and negotiations had only extended the regime’s life. The third option rejects both. No war. No bargaining. No safety net.

This approach did not begin in Washington. It was imposed by failure. And long before it entered Western policy language, it was articulated clearly by the NCRI’s President-elect for the transitional period, Maryam Rajavi. No war. No appeasement. No foreign intervention. No rescue.

5. Why marches and hashtags are not enough

January also exposed a hard truth. Massive marches alone cannot defeat a regime built on organized violence. This is not an election. It is a bloody confrontation with one of the most barbaric regimes in the world.

Public relations campaigns do not stop bullets. Social media applause does not dismantle prisons. “Love,” slogans, and reposts do not neutralize batons or paramilitary gangs.

Only organized resistance can confront organized repression. Only structure can absorb blows, regenerate leadership, and sustain momentum under fire. January did not invent this reality. It made it undeniable.

Where this leads

If the third option is to mean anything, it must be completed. That means recognizing the Iranian people’s right to resist. It means acknowledging what they are fighting for. A secular, democratic, non-nuclear Iran. And it means ending the fiction that no alternative exists.

The main organized alternative does exist. The National Council of Resistance of Iran is not symbolic or virtual. It has structure, a program, and a presence the regime itself fears.

January 2026 did not topple the regime. It did something more decisive. It ended the illusion that the Islamic Republic can be rescued.

Professor Kazem Kazerounian, University of Connecticut