The Defiant Message Iran's New Leaders Are Sending the US
Mojtaba Khamenei, and the younger hawks around him, think that Iranian restraint only encouraged American aggression. Trump could come to regret his regime change, writes Iranian-American Vali Nasr.
Before the US and Israel launched their war on Iran, Mojtaba Khamenei was an unlikely choice to succeed his father. The Islamic Revolution had ended the monarchy, and the revolution’s founder, Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, had been explicit in denouncing primogeniture. Even former Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, Mojtaba’s father, had putatively written a letter to the Assembly of Experts, which chooses the supreme leader, asking that it not consider his son. Moreover, January’s mass protests meant that choosing another Khamenei would invite even more demonstrations and deepen the divide separating the people from the state. And yet, the majority of council members chose Mojtaba anyway – sending a defiant message to the US, Israel, and the world.
This was a choice made during war, and at a time when the country is facing an existential moment. Mojtaba’s selection was meant to signal stability and continuity at home and defiance abroad. In his first public statement as supreme leader, Mojtaba endorsed Iran’s war strategy and confirmed the Islamic Republic’s resolve to realize its war goals. This should not have come as a surprise. Mojtaba had been deeply involved in the strategy that his father and Iran’s military leaders had devised after the 12 Day War with Israel in June 2025. That war ended with a tenuous ceasefire, and Iran expected that it would soon give way to another attack by an Israel determined to realize the war objectives that had eluded it in June.
Iran cannot match the United States and Israel’s capabilities in waging war, but it knows how to endure, expecting that survival would constitute victory. The opening act in Israel’s war strategy has been to eliminate Iran’s civilian and military leaders to paralyze and collapse the state. To avoid that fate, Iran has diffused decision-making authority across its government and military institutions. Rather than make decisions top-down, it has created a decision-making mosaic to survive the killing of its leaders. Mojtaba is now in command of that mosaic, but he will not replace it.