The Biggest Gamble for the Reformists

Reform movement in Iran digs in for the hardest test

 As the world woke up to the images of the signing of the much-awaited MOU between the USA and Iran, the world must have a sigh of relief, with oil prices back to normal levels, navigation in the Hormuz Strait and elsewhere also coming back to the normal level. However, the real test for the turn that things take in the coming days will determine, how fragile could be that peace; or on the other hand it might be termed a lasting document, which might actually transform the face of the region, the face of Iran as well as the consequent impact on the world at large.

The test is real for US President Donald Trump, on whom the Iranians even employed psychologists and therapists to understand and study his erratic shifts in stance and their impact on the ongoing talks between the two warring sides. It goes without saying that Trump during the last two weeks worked on himself in manner that he forewent the usual temptation all the US presidents have; to endure the tantrums of Israel, rather making his own way, restoring his credibility for the Iranians, as the last two attempts at agreement ended in the devastating strikes on 13 June 2025 and again on February 28; which caused immense leade,rship damage to the Iranians, which would be felt, not just by the Iranians themselves, but also by the region, in the days to come.

The public pressure can be gauged from the fact that prominent reform figures have to falsely claim that they were in the Bayat Rahbari on that fateful day; just to be in good light in front of the masses. The next 30 to 60 days will not be just important for the Iranian nation state, but for the political actors, who either stand to benefit from a quiet regime change or who would recede into oblivion

The biggest gamble or the tests are for the Iranian society, which had toiled for decades under punishments which were based on assumptions, scantily supported by facts and more by ‘fears’ rather than actual capability. Generations of Iranians, as well as generations everywhere might have woken up every morning though the last four decades; with the planted and hyped fear that ‘Iran is just two weeks from developing nuclear weapons.’

For the Iranians, it is an opportunity to interact with the new world which was denied to them by the free world with a single-minded approach. Towards that end; the reformist vision of talking it out with the USA was regarded as faulty analysis by the Iranian establishment on the count that like the USA’s position, it was fraught with assumptions, which needed a peculiar environment to nurture.

Towards that end; during the period of the first JCPOA finalized by the former Foreign Minister Jawad Zarif in 2015, despite apparently cordiality between the reform camp and the IRGC, there were few inklings of the disagreement, where Zarif made no bones about criticizing the legendary Quds Force supremo Maj Gen Qasem Soleimani; arguing that the ‘men of the battlefield spoiled the efforts of the men of the diplomacy’.

It was his famous statement before the 2024 elections that ‘if Jalili (radical politician) ascended to the Presidency, Iran will be at war’. Ironically, the victory of Massoud Pezeshkian instead precipitated a series of military engagements of the scale, which for any observer were not to be contained by ‘diplomatic words’ rather by the military punches, of which the IRGC was capable.

It is important to feel how the diplomatic blunders almost precipitated a regime change and how the military response turned the tables. The evening of February 27 ended on a positive diplomatic note that everything had been sorted out in the rehashed JCPOA and all that was needed was a bit of fine tuning between the Iranian FM and Steve Witcoff. The dawn of February 28 started on the ominous note. The Supreme Leader was shredded to bits by a rain of Tomahawks. So much was the chaos that the current Supreme Leader’s whereabouts were not confirmed.

It was a stage set for regime change, from the monarchist point of view and also in parts for the reformists, who had the opportunity to fill the void. However, what happened soon after within minutes was the retaliatory onslaught spearheaded by the IRGC and the regular armed forces, especially the IRIAF in tandem, quietly undertaking strike sorties without much fanfare. For the stakeholders, it was more than evident who was in charge of the affairs of the state. For the evening pro-Khamenei crowd, the choices were clear, IRGC took control of the battlefield and the pro-system crowd took care of the streets. Towards that end, the IRGC paid heavily with the loss of men and material. It systematically lost many of its senior commanders in targeted strikes, which were in all probability not possible without internal moles.

The IRGC response, hitting at the USAF and IDF infrastructure, turned the tables in the meantime. The very carefully planned attack on the infrastructure in the Gulf, not just made the Gulf an unsafe place for the coming days, but also deprived the USA of all the bases it had set up during all those previous decades.

The IRGC might not have the blood of too many US and Israeli combatants on its hands, but it hit devastatingly at the infrastructure in a manner that the USA and the IDF had to calculate their losses. As the days passed; the failure of the suspected mission against enriched uranium near Isfahan and the images of twisted wreckage of USAF C-130s exposed the fact that the US assets were airborne when hit by the Iranians and disproved the CENTCOM press note that the assets were deliberately put on fire by US troops.

When these things were happening, people witnessed that for the three weeks the reform group was nowhere to be felt anywhere. The talk of ‘talks with the USA for JCPOA’ dissolved into thin air as the reform group knew that it was the radical street and smoke-filled battlefield controlled by the IRGC which called the shots for all practical purposes.

The IRGC was in control of things. Consequently, it was the position of strength which convinced the reform group to resurface again. The talk of negotiations was not strengthened by the diplomatic camp, rather the diplomatic camp best represented by the reformist administration found that the advantages gained by the IRGC made the situation ripe enough to take a diplomatic plunge. Here it is important to note that the constant signaling by Trump within Iran was not heresy, rather that had credible proofs, which seems to be surfacing now, whether the stances taken by the reformist administration regarding dialogue with the USA or the new convert to the reformist camp the speaker of the Majlis, who despite claims to be close to Soleimani, was more in tune with Zarif, than the former.

As things stand, there are misgivings about the new JCPOA among the opponents of the deal, within the conservative camp, in the street and as the reaction from the young supreme leader emerged Thursday. Ayatollah Mojtaba Khamenei, following the tradition of his father, of being  ‘operationally’ accommodating to the sitting administrations, to be seen the way Ali Khamenei gave free hand to successive reformist presidents, argued in his message that there was great responsibility on the shoulders of the reformist administration to get to the logical conclusion of the matter.

Consequently, the mood in the street, the misgivings of the conservative camp and the word of caution from Mujtaba, all combine to suggest that talking to the USA when the US war machine waged relentless strikes on the Iranian population, has been a very delicate initiative taken by the reform group. It may be pointed out that the electronic signing instead of the physical signing with the customary handshakes was avoided by the incumbent president on the single premise that it would not go down well with the Iranians, who held the slain Supreme Leader in high esteem.

Consequently, the reformists have practically gambled whatever political capital they have in ‘talking to the enemy’. If they are able to control the variables according to the planned road map; they might relate in some manner to the various sections of Iranian society. If the road map is not realized and practically Iran is forced into a war again with IDF and CENTCOM, as happened on 13 June 2025 and February 28, it will be a death knell for the reform camp and all those who secretly wished a regime change after the Supreme Leader was killed on the morning of February 28.

The public pressure can be gauged from the fact that prominent reform figures have to falsely claim that they were in the Bayat Rahbari on that fateful day; just to be in good light in front of the masses. The next 30 to 60 days will not be just important for the Iranian nation state, but for the political actors, who either stand to benefit from a quiet regime change or who would recede into oblivion.