After weeks of massive protests sweeping the streets of Iran, President Donald Trump cheered on demonstrators on social media. “Iranian patriots, keep protesting,” he wrote on January 13. “Take over your institutions!!!… Help is on the way.”
To many, it seemed like a promise of military intervention. But the president tempered his message the next day, telling reporters that he had been told that “the killing in Iran has stopped” and that “executions will not be carried out.”
Now, the world waits to see what Mr. Trump will do: launch cyberattacks or targeted bombings; launching more economic sanctions; Iranian shipping blockade; Or do nothing at all. The US Navy has redirected the USS Abraham Lincoln carrier strike group from the Pacific to the Middle East, giving the president the tools to act — if he chooses to do so.
Why did we write this?
As mass protests in Iran lead to brutal government crackdowns, the United States is considering a response. President Donald Trump has several options available to him amid historic opposition to the current Tehran regime.
The lives of countless Iranian protesters and, more broadly, the security of the region that produces 30% of the world’s oil depend on his decision. For America’s allies and rivals alike, this is a crucial time as the White House considers its options.
“In the current Trump White House, all the measures built by Republican and Democratic White House administrations have been undone,” says Reuel Mark Gerecht, a former CIA Iranian targets officer who is now a senior fellow at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies in Washington. “This is Donald Trump’s show.”
“Doing nothing is the worst-case scenario” for Mr. Trump, but the president still has a lot of freedom, Mr. Gersht says. Mr. Gersht says the most likely military option would be air or missile strikes against military facilities of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, which handles internal security and is loyal to Iran’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. “It will shake the system, and that in itself is beneficial [to U.S. interests]says Mr. Gersht.
“Ultimately, change comes from within, not from without,” he says. “That is why the environment in Iran is so frightening for the regime, and that is why their response is more brutal than ever.”
The latest protests began less than three weeks ago, on December 28, when merchants in Tehran’s Grand Bazaar closed their shops and marched through the streets to protest the collapse of the country’s currency, the Iranian rial, and the resulting sharp rise in inflation. Food prices have risen by 72% since January last year, and inflation has ranged between 40% and 45% throughout 2025.
The protests, which have since spread to all major urban centres, represent the biggest threat to the Iranian regime since it came to power after overthrowing the country’s former king, the US-friendly Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi, in 1979. More than 2,600 people have been killed, according to the Human Rights Activists News Agency, a US-based advocacy group. The Iranian government estimates the death toll at nearly 300.
Iran’s neighbors in the Persian Gulf region – specifically Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, and Kuwait – have had their own disputes with the Shiite religious leadership in Tehran. But instead of using the protests as an excuse to take military actions of their own, most are content to watch from the sidelines. Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, who performs most government duties on behalf of his father, King Salman Al Saud, has reportedly reassured Iran that his country will not participate in any US-led action against Iran, nor will it allow its territory or airspace to be used for this purpose.
For Iran’s rivals, the protests represent a kind of endgame for the Islamic Republic, which they believe is collapsing from within. “Even if Iran’s rulers survive this uprising, it could be a Pyrrhic victory,” Vali Nasr, an Iranian-American political scientist and senior advisor at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, wrote in an article. Recent comment For CSIS.
“The bloodshed will create an unbridgeable gap with the population,” Mr. Nasr wrote. “The crackdown will neither resolve Iran’s debilitating economic situation nor restore its lost aura of power. The Islamic Republic is in a dilemma from which it cannot escape.”
If Mr. Trump seeks to de-escalate the conflict, it will come as a relief to critics at home — on both sides of the aisle. Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer of New York and Sen. Tim Kaine of Virginia, both Democrats, and others have argued that any strike against Iran would require congressional approval. Sen. Rand Paul, a Republican from Kentucky, said any strike on Iran could backfire, prompting Iranians to support the regime in wartime.
Meanwhile, Republican Senator Lindsey Graham of South Carolina urged the president to use “all means necessary” to stop the killing of protesters.
Ray Takey, a senior fellow for Middle East studies at the Council on Foreign Relations, says Trump’s unpredictability may actually be an advantage. While Republicans are more likely than Democrats to seek military intervention, they are less likely to blame their president if he does not take that step, Mr. Takey says. “Trump is an extraordinary politician; he is not bound by the normal rules of politics. He can actually say: ‘The situation in Iran is now calm and no longer requires intervention on my part.’ Previous presidents may have suffered from a credibility gap, but not Trump.”
For now, Trump said on Wednesday that Washington would “watch and see,” and on Friday he thanked the Iranian government for not pursuing what he said was the execution of political prisoners. Meanwhile, the Associated Press reports that officials from Egypt, Oman, Saudi Arabia and Qatar are urging the United States to refrain from military strikes because, they say, they would destabilize the region.
“Mr. Trump can stop because he has already used force against both Iran and Venezuela, or he can bomb them this afternoon. Anything can happen,” adds Mr. Takiyeh, who is also an American-Iranian Middle East scholar and former State Department official. “No one can say he is against the use of force.”