Donald Trump has boxed himself in by promising to ‘help’ Iran’s protesters. But he has few good options for military operations that he can control.
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Illiberal systems often look most permanent just before they change. But moments of upheaval can also produce a different illusion: That the system is one dramatic external blow away from collapse. With Iran convulsed by unprecedented protests against the country’s leadership, it is tempting to imagine that the United States’ air power could deliver the final shove.
That temptation misreads how the Islamic Republic actually survives. Coercive cohesion is the cement of the system: The ability of parallel security and political institutions to keep acting together, even when legitimacy erodes. When that cohesion holds, the system absorbs shocks that would more conventional states would fall under.
