Speaking at a Washington town hall on Monday, former CIA director and retired four-star US Army general David Petraeus told the audience that the regime’s crackdown on protests “signals enormous questions about the regime’s ability to sustain the situation,” while admitting that “it is starting to look like the regime will be able to put [the protests] down.”
Petraeus's comments come at a time of unprecedented social unrest in Iran, fueled by anti-authoritarian sentiment and a serious lack of resources. A fierce military crackdown on protests, which have lasted since late December, is reported to have killed from 5,000 to as many as 20,000, and tens of thousands are reported to have been arrested.
US President Donald Trump has threatened military action against the regime, but appeared to have called off a strike after Iran reportedly canceled hundreds of scheduled executions. Since then, tensions between the US and Iran have mounted, and many experts fear an all-out war between the two.
During the town hall, organized by UK-based anti-regime news channel Iran International and hosted by Farzin Nadimi, Petraeus analyzed the government’s actions in recent weeks as symptoms of decline, suggesting that the regime is currently under a bigger threat than since the Iran-Iraq War.
Past year has been 'very, very damaging' for Iran, Petraeus says
Citing recent degradations of Iran’s proxies, such as Hezbollah, Hamas, and the Assad regime, Petraeus labeled the past year as “very, very damaging” to Iran. Israeli and American damage to Iranian military capabilities in the 12-Day war, along with the country’s ongoing economic crisis, places the regime in a “very difficult situation,” according to Petraeus.
Contrasting the current situation in Iran with the Egyptian revolution during the Arab Spring, Petraeus warned that expecting the regime to fall could be premature. The Institute for the Study of War, of which he is a board member, published a list of indicators signaling “cracks in the regime,” as he put it.
“There are some of these appearing, but not in the kind of number that would be necessary, and certainly not in the kind of significant action that the Egyptian Army took in Tahrir Square,” he said, referencing how Egyptian soldiers refused to kill protestors, leading to the fall of the government.
“I think this is probably the beginning of the end,” Petraeus responded to a challenge from Nadimi.
“The problem is that the end is not near.”