AYESHA RASCOE, HOST:
It's been over a week since the U.S. and Israel started bombing Iran, and the timing, reasons and objectives of the war remain unclear. In the week or so since the U.S. and Israel started bombing Iran, President Trump has repeatedly mentioned regime change. For now, the Iranian government is still standing. And today, Iran's state media reports that they are finalizing the selection of a successor to the country's slain supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, but no one has been formally named just yet. Meanwhile, Iran's security forces, including its Revolutionary Guard, remain in place.
But what's their role now and in Iran's uncertain future? We're joined by Arash Azizi. He's a lecturer at Yale University and an expert on the Revolutionary Guard. Welcome to the program.
ARASH AZIZI: It's great to be with you, Ayesha. Thanks for having me.
RASCOE: So the IRGC is a very complex organization. It has kind of tentacles in politics, the economy and more. Is its survival contingent on the survival of the Islamic republic?
AZIZI: The IRGC is really complex but also decentralized. So there are different networks of military economic power, and they don't have one centralized body. They have important, you know, centers. They do construction. They do economy. They run different sections of the military. So I think they'll likely have a role in the future of Iran, even if under certain circumstances they dissolve under the name IRGC and survive, you know, as these different networks. But definitely important power players in Iran currently have relationships with the Guards.
RASCOE: We're waiting for the announcement of a new supreme leader, but one of the names floated is one of Khamenei's sons, Mojtaba, who reportedly has close ties to the IRGC. What would his ascension (ph) mean?
AZIZI: Mojtaba is connected to sections of the Guards. He's a very shadowy figure. Very, very little is known about him. He's had very little public presence. But, you know, everything indicates that he is connected to quite hard-line sections of the Guards. He also has had a relationship with Ghalibaf, who is the speaker of the parliament. He's an old guardsman, and he's effectively running the war efforts now. So he's - in the current constellation of things, he's being seen as a continuity candidate for his father as a hard-liner even though Mr. Ghalibaf has often had a different take on things and a more technocratic stance that makes him a little different.
It - but, frankly, it's hard to know what kind of supreme leader Mojtaba's going to be. As I said, he's been pretty shadowy. But there's a ferocious struggle right now over whether, you know, he should be appointed or not. Some suggest that the Assembly of Experts has already decided on him, but he's being pressured not to announce it. It's also not clear how well he's doing. He might have been injured in an attack.
So that's very much subject to a struggle right now, but he would be seen very negatively by many Iranians - might I say, even most Iranians. They'll see him as a hard-liner candidate, a replacement of his father, and also someone who's never been in the public eye all of a sudden acquiring the most powerful position in the country.
RASCOE: In speaking to reporters last week, President Trump said his administration had people within the Iranian government in mind.
(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING)
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: We had some in mind from that group that is dead, and now we have another group. They may be dead also, based on reports. So I guess you have a third wave coming in. Pretty soon we're not going to know anybody.
RASCOE: He didn't elaborate on who these groups are. But are there opposition groups that the IRGC and military would work with?
AZIZI: It's a very curious comment by the president. It seems like he was suggesting groups that are inside the regime. The first wave dead might've been someone like Ali Shamkhani, a powerful guardsman who was killed in the first of the attacks. But it's not quite clear what - I mean, if they wanted Shamkhani, you know, why would they kill him? So it's not exactly clear.
As for the opposition groups, you know, none of the groups in Iran opposition - I don't think they have any sort of prospective of really working with the IRGC, nor are they really organized enough or powerful enough to be a factor in the situation right now. All the major players are currently players inside the regime because, as I said, those of us - you know, including myself and the Democratic opposition to the regime - just have not got our act together on the level of being able to, you know, have a real shot at the game at this stage. Of course, if the war continues and if the regime is further degraded, things might change. But as things stand, it looks like President Trump is also looking for factions inside the regime, hence his invocation of Venezuela. I think he is hoping to make a deal with someone inside the regime.
RASCOE: And do you see that as a real possibility?
AZIZI: I think it's a possibility in some ways, yes. I mean, there - it's been very clear that from inside the regime, many have wanted to work with President Trump already. I mean, they repeatedly have said so. Now things have changed with the attacks, the war has gone on so long. But also Iran has limits of what it can do. So the short answer is, yes, I think there is a possibility. But the question is if both sides will find enough flexibility to make it happen, and also if the Israelis will come along and also how to sell this to the Iranian people who, after all, didn't - you know, didn't want any of this. But here we are.
RASCOE: If the IRGC doesn't survive this war, what might replace them as a new security apparatus?
AZIZI: There's the Iranian national army and also different sections of the IRGC can be, you know, reintegrated to whatever - you know, whatever new security formation there is. But there's also the national army. IRGC's a very strange organization and militia that, you know, controls the economy in Iran. So I think it would be just Iran's armed forces.
RASCOE: That's Arash Azizi, lecturer at Yale University. Thank you so much for speaking with us.
AZIZI: Thank you. Thanks for having me. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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