Why is Iran’s top brass sitting for questions?
Niloufar Goudarzi
Iran International
Under unprecedented strain at home and abroad after the June war, Tehran is adopting new tones and messaging to steady its own base.
Iran International
Under unprecedented strain at home and abroad after the June war, Tehran is adopting new tones and messaging to steady its own base.
The clearest example comes from a darkened political talk show where once-unshakeable Iranian commanders now appear compelled to sit for unusually probing interviews.
A general adjusts the ring on his finger before answering. Another clears his throat to buy time. All are addressing—or attempting to address—now-unavoidable questions verbalised by host Javad Mogui, a documentary filmmaker long aligned with the establishment.
Since the 12-day war with Israel, the show’s tone has visibly shifted: clipped, direct, and edged with the frustrations circulating inside the system.
‘Too soft on the US’
One recent guest was senior Revolutionary Guards commander Mohammad Reza Naghdi.Mogui asked him about Iran’s retaliatory strike on a US base in Iraq following the killing of Quds Force commander Qassem Soleimani in January 2020.
“Many believe the roots of the recent war go back to that moment,” Mogui said in the dim light. “That our response was too soft.” Then, quietly: “Do you accept that we did not hit the Americans well enough?”
Naghdi smiled, though not comfortably. His replacement was quietly confirmed days later.
No Americans were killed in that attack, not least because Tehran reportedly telegraphed its intentions to Washington with enough notice.
‘At home’
In another episode Mogui asked air defence chief Gholamreza Jalali where he had been when Israel struck Tehran, killing many of Iran’s top brass.
“I was at home,” Jalali said. Mogui paused. “Should the armed forces not have been ready?” Jalali replied: “We did not expect that they would target the homes of commanders.”
Other senior figures have appeared under the same narrow pool of light: foreign minister Abbas Araghchi, parliament speaker Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf, IRGC chief’s top adviser Ahmad Vahidi among others.
Each was asked about missed signals and the war’s opening hours—unamiganable without a nod from the highest authorities.
Political analyst Jaber Rajabi told Iran International TV that the candor reflects unease inside the system.
“The questions the host asks are the same ones being asked within the Revolutionary Guards and among pro-government supporters,” he said. “If they do not hear convincing answers, it could cause defections within these ranks.”
Patriotic turn
That insecurity is mirrored in Tehran’s cultural messaging.
In recent weeks the city unveiled a towering statue in Revolution Square depicting the Roman emperor Valerian kneeling before Shapur I, echoing a Sasanian relief.
The project anchors a campaign titled “You will kneel before Iran again,” launched near the anniversary of the 1979 embassy seizure.
Beneath the statue sit twelve panels narrating moments of “resistance” from Persian myth to the fight against ISIS and the recent twelve-day war.
The unveiling featured mobile LED trucks and orchestral performances, but officials insisted it was not a promotional event.
“This is the continuation of a historical truth: every invader has bowed before the will of the Iranian people,” the head of Tehran’s Beautification Organization said.
Tone not intent
Foreign reporting has noticed the same shift.
The Financial Times this week highlighted insiders arguing that Iran “must decide whether it wants to be a force that challenges or supports regional security.”
The Economist, asked whether the regime can survive five more years, replied that it likely will, though the “big question” is whether a change of leader would mean a change of regime.
Middle East correspondent Nicolas Pelham added that Iran appears to be “trying to reinvent itself,” pointing to the rise of explicit nationalist symbols.
Together, these strands point to a tactical revision rather than transformation: a state unsettled enough to justify decisions it once presented as self-evident, and determined to wrap that unease in a grander narrative of historical inevitability.
It is a shift more in register than structure—an Iran 0.2 more than 2.0.
Tehran’s unveiling of a towering statue depicting the Roman Emperor Valerian kneeling before pre-Islamic Persian King Shapur I has renewed criticism of the Islamic Republic’s appeal to nationalist sentiment following the June war with Israel.
For over forty years, the theocracy purged ancient Persian history from schoolbooks, replacing it with post-Islamic narratives. But after the 12-day conflict with Israel, officials have turned to the distant pre-Islamic past to rally a divided society.
From murals of ancient kings and soldiers to patriotic songs added to Shi’ite mourning ceremonies performed before Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei, Tehran now embraces imagery once deemed heretical by its own revolutionary ethos.
'Kneel before Iran' campaign
Tehran’s Revolution (Enghelab) Square was the scene of an unusual spectacle on Friday as officials unveiled a massive bronze statue depicting Roman Emperor Valerian kneeling in submission before Sassanid King Shapur I, commemorating Iran’s victory at the Battle of Edessa (260 AD).
The event was held under the slogan “Kneel before Iran,” part of what authorities describe as a campaign to project “national unity and historical pride” following the June war with Israel.
Tehran Mayor Alireza Zakani, a staunch ultraconservative, said on X: “Enmity with Great Iran can only end in kneeling before this historic nation.”
Municipal official Davood Goodarzi said the installation would be accompanied by visual displays depicting “other victories of Iranians over foreign aggressors,” including the defeat of British forces by local commander Rais-Ali Delvari, Mirza Kuchak Khan’s resistance against Russian troops, and Surena’s triumph over Rome at the Battle of Carrhae in 53 BCE.
The goal, Goodarzi said, is “strengthening concepts such as national dignity, social unity, and Iranian identity.”
The statue, he said, would remain temporarily at Revolution Square before being moved to a city gateway “where it will stand as the first emblem of Iran before diplomats and foreign visitors.”
Unveiled women were allowed to attend the unveiling ceremony—an uncommon scene at events organized by Tehran’s ultra-hardline municipality.
The turn to the pre-Islamic past
The sharp reversal also recalls remarks once made by Khamenei. In a 2011 speech, he asserted that “all the great military victories of this nation came after Islam,” dismissing pre-Islamic accounts as “things that are not documented.”
In 1987, he had said that prophets triumphed over kings such as Cyrus and that “nothing remains of these monarchs in history but names remembered with derision.”
Nevertheless, pro-government social media accounts have now gone so far as to circulate posters equating Khamenei himself with Shapur, showing him standing with a staff as Benjamin Netanyahu and Donald Trump kneel before him. The caption reads: “You will kneel before Iran.”
'Hypocrisy'
Pro-government figures have hailed the move as a patriotic success. Conservative political reporter Hossein Saremi posted: “Today’s grand Iranian gathering showed that people and the state share one essence: Iran itself. Nothing can take our homeland away.”
Others, however, called the spectacle “hypocrisy.” Journalist Gholamhossein Pashaei wrote on X: “Every year you close Pasargadae to stop people from celebrating Cyrus Day, yet you unveil Shapur’s statue in Enghelab Square with drums and fireworks during Fatimiyya (mourning period)!”
Dissident commentator Hamid Asafi called the ceremony “a perfect snapshot of the Islamic Republic’s contradictions.”
On Telegram he wrote: “A week ago they closed Cyrus’s tomb out of fear of the crowds, and now they glorify Shapur in the same breath. The Islamic Republic fears living history but poses for selfies with its corpse.”
He added: “They know people no longer respond to rosaries and sermons. That’s why they’ve brought history back to the stage—in a controlled costume. If they can’t erase the past, they’ll try to own it.”
The irony deepened as UNESCO formally recognized Cyrus’s Charter as one of the earliest human-rights documents.
President Masoud Pezeshkian wrote on X: “Iran, the cradle of dialogue, justice, and coexistence, can still inspire peace today.”
Users swiftly replied, questioning how such pride could coexist with a government that blocks access to Cyrus’s tomb each year to those wishing to visit it on his birthday.