I fought on the front lines against Iran. Trump can topple the mullahs in 30 days, without putting US boots on the ground. Here's how... | Retrui News | Retrui
I fought on the front lines against Iran. Trump can topple the mullahs in 30 days, without putting US boots on the ground. Here's how...
SOURCE:Daily Mail
US Army intelligence veteran Michael Pregent says American support for protesters in Iran could bring down the country's Islamist dictatorship in as little as a month.
A US Army veteran who spent years fighting Iranian-backed militias in the Middle East said Iran is closer to collapse than at any point in its 45-year history – and that President Donald Trump could finish the job within weeks if he acts decisively.
Michael Pregent, a former US Army intelligence officer and now a defense analyst at the Hudson Institute, said American military support for protesters in Iran could bring down the country's Islamist dictatorship in as little as 30 days.
Not with invading troops. Not with another endless Middle East war. But with air power, intelligence and political will.
'This is not a boots-on-the-ground mission,' Pregent told the Daily Mail. 'This is about letting Israel control Iran's airspace and targeting regime assets while the protests continue.'
Iran has been rocked this week by demonstrations over soaring inflation, currency collapse and economic misery, with unrest spreading across multiple provinces and deadly clashes reported between protesters and security forces.
State-affiliated media and rights groups say at least six people have been killed since Wednesday.
Trump on Friday openly threatened to come to the aid of demonstrators if Iranian forces open fire on civilians, declaring on social media: 'We are locked and loaded and ready to go.'
The warning came days after renewed unrest posed the biggest internal threat to Iran's clerical leadership in years – and months after US and Israeli airstrikes pummeled Iran's nuclear facilities and senior military leadership.
Police opening fire on protesters in Lordegan, Iran, which has seen decades of repression
The US already has a formidable presence in the oil-rich region – including more than 40,000 personnel and carrier strike groups
According to Pregent, that earlier intervention nearly broke the Islamic Republic.
'We were there during that 12-day campaign,' he said, referring to last year's Israeli strikes.
'Protests were ready. Just a couple more weeks and they would have been strong – but Trump told Israel to turn around.'
Pregent believes the pause allowed Iran's ruling clerics to survive by the narrowest of margins.
Now, he said, history is offering a second chance.
Army veteran Pregent saw action across Iran's borders
A former intelligence officer who served in Desert Shield, Desert Storm, Afghanistan, and alongside Kurdish Peshmerga forces in Mosul between 2005 and 2006, Pregent argued that Iran's rulers are far weaker than they appear.
'They're paper tigers,' he said, dismissing warnings from Tehran that US intervention would destabilize the region.
Senior Iranian official Ali Larijani, a top adviser to Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, warned that US interference would inflame the entire Middle East. Iran continues to arm and fund proxy forces across Lebanon, Iraq and Yemen.
But Pregent insists the regime is hollowed out.
'The Revolutionary Guard is fractured,' he said. 'If it were strong enough to dominate afterward, the regime wouldn't collapse in the first place.'
He said a carefully calibrated campaign – conducted primarily from the air – could prevent security forces from crushing protesters while avoiding civilian casualties or long-term damage to Iran's future.
'You don't attack oil facilities,' Pregent said. 'You preserve infrastructure for a future government – but you take out military formations moving toward protesters.'
That includes targeting the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), the Basij paramilitary, missile and drone launch sites, and command hubs used to direct crackdowns.
US President Donald Trump threatened Iran after he met with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, an enemy of the Islamic Republic
Shopkeepers and traders taking to the streets of the capital Tehran on Monday
Pregent said such strikes would not alienate Iranians. Quite the opposite.
'Any attack against the regime will be considered an attack against the regime by the Iranian people,' he said. 'The protesters in Iran want an ally, and they saw one in what Israel was doing. They wanted it to continue.'
He also urges the US to keep Iran connected to the outside world by maintaining internet access – a lifeline for organizers and citizen journalists.
'Keep the internet up,' he said bluntly. 'Protesters need internet. Starlink needs to be up.'
The US already has a formidable presence in the oil-rich region – more than 40,000 personnel, carrier strike groups, an air base in Qatar, and a Navy fleet headquarters in Bahrain.
Alongside airstrikes and intelligence operations, Pregent said US and allied naval forces could establish warship-backed humanitarian corridors to protect civilians and provide aid, without ever setting foot on Iranian soil.
'This is an air campaign, an intelligence campaign, and a messaging campaign,' he said. 'Not the 82nd Airborne jumping into Iran.'
The stakes, he warns, could not be higher. Rights groups report arrests across western Iran, including Kurdish areas, while verified video shows crowds chanting 'Death to the dictator' and hurling abuse at security forces outside burning police stations.
Reuters footage captured gunshots ringing out as demonstrators confronted authorities overnight on Thursday.
Iran's leaders have survived repeated uprisings by unleashing brutal force. The 2022 protests sparked by the death of a young woman in custody left hundreds dead and paralyzed the country for weeks.
Pregent said hesitation now would be catastrophic.
'If Trump draws red lines and doesn't follow through, the regime survives – and then it goes after everyone who protested,' he said. 'If we stop again, the regime survives – and a lot of Iranians will lose their lives.'
A large group of protesters in Tehran on December 29. The unrest began due to an acute economic crisis affecting the country's currency which has caused soaring inflation
Pregent said the US should target Basij paramilitaries, a force that Tehran deploys to quell protests
He accused US presidents of repeating the same mistake for decades: loud rhetoric followed by retreat.
'This requires follow-through, not bumper-sticker foreign policy,' he said.
Pregent is skeptical Trump will stay the course, warning that outside pressure could once again derail action.
He points to Qatar – which shares massive gas fields with Iran – and Turkey's President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan as potential brakes on US intervention.
'Back channels get opened. Pressure gets applied,' he said. 'We've seen this movie before.'
Others argue air power alone has rarely produced regime change without internal elite defections.
They also caution that even limited strikes could trigger retaliation against US forces in Iraq or the Gulf, and note America's repeated failures in Iraq, Afghanistan and elsewhere to convert Muslim dictatorships into democracies.
For many Iranians, including those who detest their own clerics, American or Israeli attacks are deeply unwelcome.
Even supporters of tougher action concede that Iran's opposition remains fragmented, with no single figure or movement clearly positioned to lead a post-clerical government.
Trump did not specify what action the US might take. A State Department spokesperson said Washington would continue its 'maximum pressure' campaign, accusing Tehran of squandering billions on terror proxies and nuclear ambitions.
Any US military action would raise questions about congressional approval and international legality, particularly if strikes were carried out without a direct attack on American forces.
Iran's newly elected President Masoud Pezeshkian has struck a softer tone, admitting government failures and pledging dialogue over the cost-of-living crisis.
But hardliners remain dominant, and security forces continue to confront demonstrators.
Inflation officially exceeds 36 percent. The rial has plunged. Sanctions are biting. Regional allies have fallen. Hezbollah has been battered. Syria's Bashar al-Assad is gone.
According to Pregent, all that remains is resolve.
'People are sacrificing their lives right now,' he said. 'If the president uses words like that, he has to mean them.'
A lone protestor sits in the middle of the road in front of armed security forces
Iran was pounded into submission by Israeli and US airstrikes on its nuclear program in June 2025
Iran's Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and other clerics could be gone in 30 days, said Pregent
He believes a sustained campaign could push Iran past the point of no return.
'Thirty days of sustained air support and the regime would have collapsed,' Pregent said.
And if it doesn't? Then, he warns, the aftermath will be grim. Mass arrests. Disappearances. Executions.
'This is a moment,' he said. 'Either sustained support leads to regime collapse – or hesitation leaves a wounded dictatorship that will take revenge.'
For the protesters on Iran's streets, Pregent said, the message from Washington matters as much as missiles.
'They're watching,' he said. 'And they're waiting to see if America means what it said this time.'