IRGC takes de facto control of Iran government amid deepening power struggle

What appears, at first glance, as a dynastic shift is in fact the continuation of an ideological and institutional project: the consolidation and reproduction of Khameneism.

The central argument is straightforward: Mojtaba Khamenei does not represent a new phase in the Islamic Republic. He represents the success of a long-term process of “rail-laying”—a deliberate restructuring of power that ensures continuity regardless of who formally occupies the position of Supreme Leader. In this sense, the system no longer depends on individual authority; it reproduces a predefined ideological and political logic.

This transformation was made possible by the way Ali Khamenei maximized the latent capacities of the Islamic Republic’s constitutional framework. The constitution already concentrates extraordinary power in the office of the Supreme Leader. However, Khamenei did not merely operate within these limits—he expanded and operationalized them. Over 37 years, he systematically turned flexible or ambiguous mechanisms into rigid and enforceable structures, embedding his ideological preferences into the institutional fabric of the state.

One of the clearest examples of this process is the evolution of the Supreme Council of the Cultural Revolution. This body, notably absent from the constitution, was gradually transformed under Khamenei into a central pillar of ideological control. What began as a mechanism for purging universities in the early years of the revolution became a highly structured institution with dozens of sub-councils, extending its reach across education, culture, media, and social policy. It evolved into a powerful instrument for shaping and policing societal norms—without ever requiring formal constitutional legitimacy. This is Khameneism in practice: the ability to formalize control without formal law.

A similar trajectory can be observed in the transformation of the Guardian Council. Originally conceived as a supervisory body overseeing legislation and elections, it was reengineered into a decisive mechanism for controlling political outcomes. Through expanded vetting powers and systematic disqualification of candidates, the council moved from oversight to orchestration. Over time, it became capable not only of influencing elections but effectively determining their results in advance. This shift—from supervision to engineering—was not incidental; it was a key step in institutionalizing Khameneism.

These developments were not isolated. They formed part of a broader strategy to eliminate unpredictability from the system. Independent political actors were sidelined, reformist currents neutralized, and institutional autonomy steadily eroded. What emerged was a tightly controlled ecosystem in which all meaningful levers of power—political, judicial, cultural, and economic—were aligned with a single ideological framework.

Within this context, the emergence of Mojtaba Khamenei as a central figure becomes comprehensible. His lack of traditional religious credentials or broad political legitimacy is not a contradiction—it is a consequence of the system’s evolution. Years of institutional engineering, including the careful management of the Assembly of Experts and the systematic removal of potential obstacles, made such a transition possible. The “selection” process itself reflects the culmination of Khamenei’s long-term restructuring: a system in which outcomes are preconfigured rather than contested.

More importantly, Mojtaba’s rise demonstrates that Khameneism has achieved a critical threshold—it can now sustain itself without its original architect. The ideology has been embedded so deeply within the system that any successor, regardless of personal inclination, is compelled to operate within its parameters. The structure dictates the outcome.

This is why the question of leadership succession is, in many ways, secondary. Whether it is Mojtaba Khamenei or another figure, the current institutional configuration leaves little room for deviation. The mechanisms of control, the networks of power, and the ideological priorities—particularly the emphasis on regime preservation, anti-Western positioning, and hostility toward Israel even at significant national cost—are all structurally entrenched.

Khameneism, therefore, is no longer simply an ideology associated with one leader. It is a system of governance—self-reinforcing, expansive, and resistant to change. The Islamic Republic has, through decades of deliberate restructuring, lost its capacity to generate alternative political paths from within.

In this sense, Mojtaba Khamenei is not the beginning of a new chapter. He is the continuation of a trajectory that has been decades in the making.

And perhaps more significantly, this continuity underscores a deeper reality: the Islamic Republic has reached a point where change from within has become structurally improbable. The very mechanisms designed to preserve the system have also eliminated its flexibility.

Khameneism, as both ideology and structure, may ultimately define not only how the system survives—but how it ends. It sustains the Islamic Republic by centralizing power, eliminating dissent, and enforcing ideological conformity across all institutions. Yet those same mechanisms steadily erode the foundations of long-term stability: public trust, institutional adaptability, and economic resilience. A system built to prevent deviation becomes incapable of reform; a state designed to suppress a crisis becomes dependent on perpetual coercion to manage it.

In this sense, Khameneism transforms survival into a self-consuming process. Each cycle of repression narrows the regime’s options further, raises the cost of governance, and deepens the gap between state and society. The tools that once ensured control—security dominance, ideological rigidity, and exclusion of alternative voices—gradually become liabilities, locking the system into a path where it can neither evolve nor retreat.

As a result, Khameneism may determine not only the durability of the Islamic Republic, but also the form of its eventual breakdown: not a sudden collapse, but an accumulated exhaustion. A system that endures by sacrificing its capacity to renew itself ultimately reaches a point where continuation itself becomes unsustainable.

The 33-page document shared with Iran International by the hacktivist group Edalat-e Ali (Ali’s Justice) has been marked “very confidential” and is titled Instruction for Identification, Maintenance, and Use of Positions.

The document is attributed to the Specialized Documents Center of the Intelligence and Operations Deputy of the IRGC's missile command.

A framework for missile operations

What emerges from the directive is a bureaucratic framework for missile deployment that goes well beyond hardened silos or underground “missile cities.”

The text lays out categories of launch positions, inspection procedures, coding systems, site records, chains of responsibility and rules for maintaining access to a wide network of locations that can be used before, during and after missile fire.

Its significance lies not only in the variety of launch positions it defines, but in the explicit inclusion of non-military environments in that system.

In its introduction, the document says missile positions are an inseparable part of missile warfare tactics and argues that the enemy’s growing ability to detect, track and destroy missile systems requires special rules for identifying, selecting, using and maintaining such positions.

It adds that the use of “deception,” “cover” and “normalization” alongside other methods would make the force more successful in using those positions.

That language is important. It suggests the document is not merely about protecting fixed military assets. It is about making missile units harder to distinguish from their surroundings and harder to detect in the first place.

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  Iran’s military uses schools and civilian sites during US-Israeli war

Civilian locations as missile cover

The implication of the directive is that it describes a system for embedding missile activity within ordinary civilian geography.

Rather than relying only on conventional military facilities, the document sets out a model in which missile units can move across a wider landscape of pre-identified sites selected for concealment, access and operational utility.

The result is a structure that appears designed to preserve launch capability while reducing visibility and complicating detection.

The clearest indication comes in the section on what the document describes as artificial dispersion or cover positions. These include service, industrial and sports centers, as well as sheds and warehouses – places that are civilian in function or appearance, but can be repurposed to hide missile units.

The conditions listed for such sites include being enclosed, not overlooked by surrounding buildings, and either lacking CCTV cameras or allowing them to be switched off.

Taken together, those requirements point to a deliberate screening process for civilian sites that can be used as missile cover. The concern is not only protection from attack, but invisibility within the civilian landscape.

The broader structure of the document reinforces that conclusion. It contains sections on site identities, naming and coding, inspections of routes and positions, record maintenance and responsibilities across intelligence, operations, engineering, communications, safety, health and counterintelligence.

This is the language of a standing system, not an improvised wartime workaround.

A system for concealment

Farzin Nadimi, a senior defense and security analyst at the Washington Institute who reviewed the document for Iran International’s The Lead with Niusha Saremi, said the text points to a database-driven effort to identify areas around missile bases that can be used for different kinds of positions.

He said the IRGC missile force appears to have mapped not only launch positions, but also dispersal, deception and technical positions – the latter being places suitable for storing launchers and support vehicles and, when needed, preparing missiles for firing.

“These technical positions,” Nadimi said, “can include large, covered spaces such as industrial sheds or sports halls, where missile launchers and support vehicles can be brought inside, and where missiles can be mounted onto launchers, warheads attached and, in the case of liquid-fueled systems, fueling operations carried out.”

That point is critical. If civilian-looking or civilian-owned structures are being used not only to shelter launchers, but also to prepare them for launch, then the document describes more than concealment. It describes the embedding of missile operations inside civilian infrastructure.

A network built for dispersal

Nadimi also said the directive places repeated emphasis on speed – getting launch vehicles into these buildings quickly before launch and returning them to cover quickly afterward.

In his reading, the database tied to these positions includes technical features of each site, access routes and nearby facilities, including the nearest medical center, police station and military post.

It also, he added, records whether use of the property can be coordinated in advance with the owner, including contact details, or whether occupation could occur without prior coordination in urgent cases.

If so, that would suggest the system extends down to the level of property access and local civilian surroundings, turning seemingly ordinary sites into preplanned nodes in a missile network.

The document’s own emphasis on route inspection, site profiles, records and coded classification supports the picture of a missile force operating through a dispersed support architecture rather than through fixed bases alone.

Why this puts civilians at risk

Nadimi warned that the use of civilian environments is especially troubling because many IRGC launchers are themselves designed to blend into civilian traffic.

“Many of these launchers essentially resemble civilian vehicles or trailers,” he said.

He added that larger launchers for Khorramshahr missiles can be covered with a white casing that makes them look like an ordinary white civilian trailer, while the towing vehicle is also typically white.

Smaller launchers, he said, are often painted not in conventional camouflage but in ways that make them less conspicuous in civilian surroundings.

That observation fits closely with the document’s emphasis on cover, concealment and post-launch disappearance. The combination of disguised launch vehicles and preidentified civilian sites suggests an operational doctrine built around blending missile units into non-military space.

According to Nadimi, this has direct consequences under the laws of war.

“The use of civilian environments, structures and buildings for this purpose is unlawful under the laws of war,” he said. “It removes the protection those buildings would otherwise have and turns them into legitimate military targets.”

The danger, he added, is that civilians living or working in such places may have no idea a missile launcher is being hidden in their vicinity until they themselves are exposed to attack.

An organized doctrine, not an exception

The leaked directive therefore appears to document something broader than the existence of underground missile facilities or dispersed launch sites.

It points to an organized method for extending missile operations into the civilian sphere – using industrial buildings, service facilities, sports complexes, warehouses and other non-military spaces as part of a launch architecture designed to survive surveillance, evade detection and preserve firing capability under wartime pressure.

In that sense, the document is not just about positions where missiles are launched from. It is about how a military force can fold launch operations into everyday civilian geography – and in doing so, transfer the risks of missile warfare onto places and people that outwardly have nothing to do with it.

The sources said the detainees had worked with financial entities tied to the Islamic Republic, including companies linked to the Guards, helping transfer funds on their behalf.

They said companies linked to those arrested were shut down and their offices closed.

UAE authorities also summoned some other money changers and told them to leave the country, the sources said.

The development follows earlier measures targeting Iranian nationals in the UAE. In recent days, some Iranian residents outside the country found their residency visas revoked before returning, preventing re-entry, according to accounts received by Iran International on Saturday.

Several affected individuals said the cancellations were carried out without prior notice. One Iranian resident said that after traveling to India with his family following the outbreak of war, he discovered his residency had been revoked, while his non-Iranian family members were still allowed to return to the UAE.

Earlier reports had also pointed to the cancellation of tourist visas for Iranian nationals traveling to the country.

Pezeshkian has criticized the approach of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps regarding escalating tensions and continuing attacks on neighboring countries, warning about the economic consequences of the situation, according to the sources who spoke on condition of anonymity.

He has stressed that without a ceasefire, Iran’s economy could face total collapse within three weeks to one month, the sources said.

On March 7, Pezeshkian in a video message apologized for what he called “fire at will” attacks by the country’s armed forces on neighboring countries and instructed them to stop such attacks.

However, the attacks continued shortly after the release of his message.

Call for restoration of executive power

Informed sources told Iran International that Pezeshkian has called for executive and managerial powers to be returned to the administration, a demand that has been firmly rejected by Vahidi.

In response to the criticism, the IRGC commander blamed the current situation on the government’s failure to implement structural reforms before the conflict began, the sources said.

In recent days, Israeli media have also reported signs of divisions within Iran’s ruling system. The Times of Israel, citing a senior Israeli official, wrote: “There are signs of cracks in the Iranian regime. We are now creating conditions for its overthrow, but ultimately everything depends on the Iranian people.”

The Israeli outlet Ynet also reported similar internal divisions earlier this month.

Economic impacts

As the war enters its fifth week, its economic effects are increasingly visible. Reports from major cities indicate that many ATMs are out of cash, not functioning, or physically inaccessible, while online banking services for several major banks, including Bank Melli, are periodically disrupted.

Government employees have told Iran International that salaries and benefits for large segments of workers have not been paid regularly over the past three months.

In February, before the outbreak of the ongoing war, average inflation for basic necessities reached triple digits, estimated between 105% and 115%.

The comments come as U.S. President Donald Trump said Thursday he would pause planned strikes on Iran’s energy infrastructure for 10 days until April 6, saying the move followed a request from Tehran and that negotiations were continuing.

Iranian officials have confirmed receiving proposals for talks but say they are reviewing them while insisting Iran will not accept ultimatums.

The war, now entering its fourth week, has already drawn in multiple regional actors and heightened tensions around strategic chokepoints such as the Strait of Hormuz, raising concerns that a wider confrontation could disrupt global energy flows and destabilize the region further.

Saba Zanganeh, a former diplomat close to the office of Iran’s Supreme Leader, told the moderate outlet Fararu on March 25 that the conflict should prompt regional governments to reconsider their security policies and alliances.

He said regional governments have often acted as secondary players under foreign influence, worsening conflicts rather than resolving them. The current war, he added, offers a stark lesson that continuing the existing model will deepen regional crises.

He argued that decades of instability stem from what he described as “a flawed strategic paradigm shared by regional states and external powers,” which he said has repeatedly produced destruction and fragmentation in countries including Iraq, Syria, Lebanon, Libya, Sudan, Somalia and Yemen.

Hossein Mousavian, Iran’s former ambassador to Germany, offered a more confrontational assessment.

Speaking to Etemad Online, he said Iranian officials increasingly view Persian Gulf Arab states as partners in the conflict, sharing what he described as a common objective of the “complete destruction of Iran.”

Mousavian said Tehran is preparing for the possibility of a broader confrontation involving the United States and its regional allies.

Another former diplomat, Kourosh Ahmadi, suggested the conflict may last far longer than initially expected.

Speaking to Fararu, he noted that both Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu first suggested the war might last only four to seven days before revising their estimates to several weeks. Even those expectations may prove unrealistic, he said.

Ahmadi pointed to Iran’s ability to restrict or control shipping in the Strait of Hormuz as a decisive factor in prolonging the conflict. As long as Tehran maintains that leverage over one of the world’s most critical energy chokepoints, he argued, the war is unlikely to end quickly.

“Israel seeks the collapse and incapacitation of Iran, not merely political concessions,” he said, arguing that Washington’s goals were more limited and often diverged from that of Israel.

Despite their different emphases, the three former diplomats share a similar underlying assessment: the current conflict risks evolving into a prolonged regional crisis whose consequences could reshape the Middle East for years.