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<\/p>\nWASHINGTON\u00a0\u2014\u00a0The Defense Department last week outlined a concise set of military objectives in President Trump\u2019s war against Iran, claiming its ultimate goal is to dismantle Tehran\u2019s ability to project power beyond its borders. Yet it may be targets the Pentagon has largely left unacknowledged that offer the clearest insight yet into Trump\u2019s true intentions.<\/p>\n
U.S. military strikes have focused on Iran\u2019s ballistic missile, drone and nuclear programs, as well as its naval assets, according to U.S. Central Command. But strikes have also increasingly targeted Iran\u2019s internal security forces, used by the Islamic Republic to suppress public dissent, according to an analysis from the Institute for the Study of War and the Critical Threats Project shared with The Times.<\/p>\n
The strikes have targeted at least 123 headquarters, barracks and local bases operated by Iran\u2019s paramilitary organizations, including the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps and its Basij militia. Regional police forces, primarily in the capital region around Tehran and in western Iran, near areas dominated by Kurdish groups hostile to the Iranian government, have also been targeted.<\/p>\n
Some of those groups are being armed and supported by the U.S. intelligence community, a U.S. official said, speaking on the condition of anonymity to speak candidly.<\/p>\n
Nicholas Carl, with the Critical Threats Project, said the pattern indicates the campaign is already underway to set the conditions for a revolution.<\/p>\n
\u201cAs we are going after these repressive institutions, we are degrading the ability of the regime to monitor its population, to repress its population,\u201d Carl said. \u201cAnd so it looks as though the strike campaign may be organized around trying to erode the ability of the regime to repress in those areas.\u201d<\/p>\n
Analysts said that strikes against internal forces could be greater than they have measured thus far, noting the difficulty of tracking targets in the war based on publicly available data due to an internet blackout strictly enforced by the Iranian government.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
An explosion erupts after strikes near Azadi Tower close to Mehrabad International Airport in Tehran on Saturday.<\/p>\n
(Atta Kenare \/ AFP \/ Getty Images)<\/p>\n
The quieter side of the U.S. campaign suggests a political strategy by the Trump administration that goes beyond simply containing the Iranian government, and may instead aim to lay the groundwork for its overthrow.<\/p>\n
Trump and his top aides have been inconsistent in their messaging<\/a> on their goals for the war, vacillating between calls for regime change and far shorter ambitions, such as an Islamic Republic that remains in power under leadership more acquiescent to the United States.<\/p>\n Before the war began, Trump was presented with an intelligence assessment that large-scale military action was unlikely to topple the Iranian government, two sources familiar with the assessment said. The assessment led analysts at the CIA, the State Department and the Pentagon all to advise the White House against proceeding with the operation. The intelligence analysis was first reported by the Washington Post.<\/p>\n Share via Close extra sharing options <\/p>\n Greasing the wheels for domestic unrest, for insurgency or revolution could serve other strategic purposes for the Trump administration beyond effecting regime change, adding new sources of pressure on an Islamic Republic that, if still intact by war\u2019s end, would face renewed internal pressures at a moment of historic weakness.<\/p>\n Rob Malley, lead negotiator on the 2015 Iran nuclear deal and special U.S. envoy for Iran under President Biden, said that a sustained U.S. campaign that cripples Iran\u2019s ability to maintain domestic control could mean \u201cthe regime collapses, in the sense that it can no longer, genuinely and effectively, govern the entirety of the country.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cRight now, what Trump is saying suggests an extremely ambitious, extremely long-term, extremely perilous campaign that will only end with Iran\u2019s surrender, and it\u2019s very hard to see Iran surrendering,\u201d Malley said. But the campaign may already be working. \u201cTheir communications have certainly been penetrated \u2014 they cannot meet without being targeted by Israel or the United States,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n A woman holds a portrait of the late Ayatollah Ali Khamenei at a protest Saturday by medical professionals outside Gandhi Hospital in Tehran, which was damaged in an airstrike earlier this week.<\/p>\n (Majid Saeedi \/ Getty Images)<\/p>\n \u201cEither the regime stays in place weakened, bloodied, finding it harder to govern a more fragmented, chaotic country,\u201d Malley continued, \u201cor the regime no longer can govern.\u201d<\/p>\n An Israeli official did not deny that internal security forces were being targeted, although the official said that Israel was focused on assassinating Iran\u2019s political and security leadership \u2014 \u201ctiers one, two and three,\u201d the official said. The vast majority of the strikes against internal security services thus far have been conducted by the United States.<\/p>\n \u201cOur goal is to weaken the ayatollah regime, to a point where the Iranian people can choose their fate,\u201d the official told The Times. \u201cIt\u2019s still not at the point where they can do that, but there is work still to be done.\u201d<\/p>\n By all accounts, the campaign against Iran\u2019s military assets has achieved success. Iranian ballistic missile attacks against Israel and U.S. forces and allies in the region have decreased by 90% after just a week of combat, Defense officials said. Drone strikes have decreased by 83%. Over 30 Iranian vessels, including those used as launching pads for drones and aircraft, have been destroyed \u2014 a significant number for Iran\u2019s aged and ill-funded naval fleet.<\/p>\n Trump could simply declare victory based on these results alone, said Elliott Abrams, who served as Trump\u2019s special representative for Iran in 2020.<\/p>\n \u201cThey will get weaker as they use up resources and we bomb more and more relevant sites. Already air traffic is starting up again,\u201d Abrams said, noting that commercial flights in the region began resuming this weekend. \u201cSo I doubt that the president will need a protracted campaign.\u201d<\/p>\n But that would leave the regime in place, leaving open the possibility of a revanchist Islamic Republic that could reconstitute its military and crack down further on democratic protesters \u2014 an outcome that could create political backlash for Trump, Abrams said, after losing U.S. service members in combat.<\/p>\n A woman jogs amid closed shops in south Tel Aviv on Saturday.<\/p>\n (Olympia de Maismont \/ AFP \/ Getty Images)<\/p>\n \u201cThe outcome remains entirely in doubt \u2014 regime collapse after a wave of protests, civil war, a deal that leaves the regime in place behind a new face,\u201d Abrams added. \u201cA real test for Trump would arise if there is a wave of protests as in January, and the regime again starts shooting. Can he do nothing? Unlikely.\u201d<\/p>\n In his initial speech announcing the start of the campaign<\/a>, Trump addressed the people of Iran, telling them to shelter in their homes until the U.S. bombing campaign concludes.<\/p>\n \u201cWhen we are finished, take over your government. It will be yours to take. This will be probably your only chance for generations,\u201d the president said. \u201cFor many years, you have asked for America\u2019s help. But you never got it. No president was willing to do what I am willing to do tonight. Now you have a president who is giving you what you want. So let\u2019s see how you respond.\u201d<\/p>\n But the president\u2019s message grew muddled over the course of the last week, after he offered conflicting goals in a series of interviews with reporters.<\/p>\n He at once said he was expecting to hand-select the next ayatollah, after assassinating Iran\u2019s longtime supreme leader, Ali Khamenei, in the opening salvo of the war. In other interviews, he said that the joint U.S.-Israeli campaign had killed many of the potential leaders that Washington could have worked with.<\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/1772966467_279_.jpeg\")
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