The Third Phase of the Iranian Revolution

There is a recurring tendency among Western analysts to interpret Iran’s political transformations through categories imported from the European experience. The idea that the Islamic Republic is entering a “Third Republic”, for example, suggests a rupture akin to the successive French republics. More problematically, this framing reinforces an Orientalist interpretation of an almost dynastic succession of power in Iran.

It may be more appropriate to understand the current moment not as the birth of another Republic, but as a third historical phase of the same political project that began in 1979.

The first phase was marked by the Islamic Revolution, the war imposed by Iraq and the construction of a new institutional architecture based on Wilayat al-Faqih, the governance of the Islamic jurist. Within this framework, it was necessary simultaneously to preserve the revolution, defend the country’s territory and transform its principles into institutions capable of withstanding immense external pressure.

The second phase began after the death of Imam Khomeini and the rise of Ayatollah Seyyed Ali Khamenei. During this period, Iran ceased to be merely a revolution struggling to ensure its survival and consolidated itself as a regional power.

It was also during this period that what would later become known as the Axis of Resistance took shape: a political and strategic architecture involving movements and forces which, despite their national and ideological differences, shared opposition to US hegemony and the Israeli occupation.

The third phase is beginning now, under even more dramatic circumstances, following the martyrdom of Leader Seyyed Ali Khamenei and the rise of Ayatollah Seyyed Mojtaba Khamenei amid war.

Recent changes in the military and security commands suggest that Iran is institutionalising the lessons learned from the confrontations of recent years. Appointments to key positions in the Armed Forces, the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, the Basij popular mobilisation organisation and the Supreme National Security Council point towards greater centralisation of command, stronger intelligence capabilities, preparation of the domestic front and an enhanced capacity for rapid response.

The appointment of experienced commanders to sensitive areas, particularly the IRGC Navy, assumes additional importance at a time when the Strait of Hormuz lies at the centre of regional confrontation.

More significant, however, is the language adopted by the new leadership. Iran’s traditional “strategic patience” appears to be giving way to a doctrine of maximum deterrence, explicitly accompanied by the capacity to conduct powerful offensive operations.

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This represents an important shift.

Deterrence no longer means simply absorbing attacks, avoiding a wider war and responding in a calculated manner. It now also means preserving the initiative and imposing sufficiently high costs on the adversary to alter its calculations.

This transformation does not, however, mean that Iran is abandoning the regional dimension of its strategy in favour of a policy focused exclusively on defending its own borders. It is precisely here that Palestine remains central.

Recently, Hamas Political Bureau member and head of external political relations Basim Naim stated that the movement had received “with deep interest” the positions expressed by Iranian Supreme National Security Council Secretary Mohsen Rezaei regarding the continuation of support for the Palestinian resistance and the need to bring an end to the war throughout the region, including Gaza and Lebanon.

The statement is revealing. If the second phase of the Islamic Republic built the Axis of Resistance as a form of regional strategic depth, the third appears set to adapt it to the conditions of a more direct confrontation with the United States and “Israel”.

Within this framework, Gaza is not a peripheral issue in Iranian foreign policy. Palestine remains one of the political and symbolic elements that bind this regional architecture together.

There is, therefore, only an apparent contradiction between increasing offensive capabilities and advocating an end to regional wars. In Iranian strategic thinking, greater military power is intended to raise the cost of aggression and thereby strengthen deterrence.

Diplomacy has not disappeared from this strategy. But it apparently is no longer regarded as sufficient.

The third phase of the Islamic Republic appears to proceed from a harsher conclusion: negotiate whenever possible, preserve alliances, strengthen the resistance and, at the same time, prepare for a prolonged conflict.

Iran, therefore, is not necessarily entering a “Third Republic”. It is entering the third phase of its revolution, inaugurated amid war, direct confrontation with its adversaries and a profound transformation of its deterrence doctrine.

Perhaps none of the previous phases began in a strategic environment that so clearly revealed the Islamic Republic’s capacity for resistance, adaptation and projection of power. It is precisely under maximum pressure from its adversaries that this new stage of the Iranian Revolution is opening — not as an expression of retreat, but as evidence of its capacity to weather the storms and redefine its place in the regional and international order.

Sayid Marcos Tenório is a historian, writer and analyst specialising in Middle Eastern geopolitics. He is President of the Brazil-Iran Friendship Institute and author of Palestine: From the Myth of the Promised Land to the Land of Resistance.

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The views expressed in this article belong to the author and do not necessarily reflect the editorial policy of Middle East Monitor.