The US president who likes to keep the world guessing about his endgame in Iran is now telling the world what he wants.
In a war widely described as his “war of choice”, Donald Trump says he also wants to choose who will rule Iran now that its Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and dozens of other clerics and commanders have been assassinated.
That seems unthinkable for a clerical regime rooted in deep distrust of America – among its most ideological elements there is burning hostility towards the country they labelled long ago as the “great Satan”.
Whether Iran’s embattled leadership would be mindful of choosing a top cleric willing to work in a different way with Washington is not clear.
There has long been a division between factions known as reformers and pragmatists, and the hardliners who call themselves Principlists in the defence of their revolution.
But they are united on one goal: the survival of the system that keeps them in power. One week into this existential battle, the hardliners still seem to be holding sway.
In his latest remarks, the US president then made it clear that he would only choose “a GREAT AND ACCEPTABLE leader” after Iran’s “unconditional surrender”.
There is no sign of that either.
Trump’s latest musings seem to underline that his current goal is not regime change, but a change in the regime – although he is known to veer in his views from one day to the next.
It is a stance that will let down Iranians who dared to hope that the end of the top cleric would pave the way for the end of his Islamic Republic.
“I have to be involved in the appointment, like with Delcy (Rodriguez) in Venezuela,” Trump told the Axios news website and Reuters in telephone interviews.
He has repeatedly referenced the US’s military action in Caracas on 3 January as the “perfect scenario” for Iran. His forces extracted their leader, Nicolás Maduro, suffered no casualties, and caused no chaos.