Barely an hour after the first US and Israeli missiles struck Iran, President Donald Trump made clear he hoped for regime change. Washington has a long, complicated past when it comes to regime change. But as with the shah, who was overthrown in Iran's 1979 Islamic Revolution after decades of increasingly unpopular rule, regime change rarely goes as planned. "We must abandon the failed policy of nation-building and regime change," he said in 2016. "There are those who could claim that what we did in Venezuela is not regime change," said Schanzer, at the Foundation for Defence of Democracies.

Source: The Telegraph March 01, 2026 11:23 UTC