A nation of 90 million people is watching its homeland being impoverished, terrorized, plundered, and driven toward the abyss by a ruling cult that would rather destroy Iran than surrender power. For nearly half a century, the Islamic Republic has consumed the country it claims to govern — its wealth, its dignity, its security, and the hopes of generations of Iranians. Today, as economic collapse, political repression, and the specter of war converge, Iran is no longer merely enduring another crisis. It is approaching a historic breaking point, while an entire nation waits to see whether the regime that has held it captive since 1979 will finally fall — or drag the country into the abyss with it.

Iran is engulfed in utter chaos, its economy already in collapse. An incompetent government, presided over by a subservient and populist president, convenes emergency meetings as the country sinks deeper into a frightening and increasingly dire crisis. Yet, the Iranian people no longer heed the regime’s deceptive promises. The government has lost its grip on the economy and its ability to rein in inflation. Tehran’s markets, too, have become unmoored, descending into turmoil and disorder. The meaningless pronouncements of state officials — their hollow assurances and empty promises — no longer command the slightest credibility among Iranians.

Since 1979, a criminal cult has ravaged, plundered, suppressed, and occupied the country in the service of a hollow and fraudulent ideology. In reality, 90 million people remain captive in the grip of this cult. More recently, its rulers have even begun proclaiming themselves “the superpower of the world,” boasting that they have “defeated America and Israel” and declaring that “the region will not be safe as long as even one American soldier remains in the Middle East.” Every regime-controlled platform, from official state outlets to the pulpits of Friday prayers, is now consumed with threats against President Donald Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, while Islamic murderers and criminals, amplified by the regime’s propaganda machine, relentlessly fan the flames of hostility toward Israel and the United States.

The policy pursued by Iran’s military and security establishment remains one of warmongering and deliberate crisis-making. Trump, meanwhile, says that we do not know whom to talk to in Iran. But that raises an obvious question: If he does not know, what purpose is served by this hollow theater of negotiations with Islamic murderers and terrorists? Six years of Trump’s presidency have been consumed by the pursuit of this impossible dream, without yielding so much as a single signed piece of paper.

The regime is bringing criminals out of prisons, putting swords, knives, and sledgehammers into their hands, and unleashing them to issue threats against the only alternative and the leader of Iran’s national uprising, Crown Prince Reza Pahlavi, including explicit threats against his life. Alongside the regime stands a jealous, narrow-minded, ambitious, and self-aggrandizing Iranian opposition: religious-nationalists, reformists, communists, Kurdish separatists (KDPI, Komala), anti-Israel and anti-American terrorists such as the Mujahedin-e Khalq, discredited human rights activists, mercenaries, and others. They stand aligned, effectively acting in concert. Much of the Iranian opposition amounts to little more than a collection of puppets performing before the cameras.

The regime’s propaganda apparatus continues to promote weapons training, as though a regime standing on the precipice of collapse is preparing to drive its own supporters toward urban warfare. Under the banner of confronting America and Israel, military and weapons training continues, and the objective could hardly be clearer: to bring the war into Iran’s cities, its streets, and its alleyways. Islamic terrorists know neither the meaning of peace nor the value of life and security.

The Revolutionary Guard and security officials, meanwhile, squander much of their days in one meeting after another. Terrified by the country’s deepening crisis, they shelter behind a bankrupt and discredited government. Agriculture, industry, and production have ground to a halt. There is neither a coherent plan nor an effective mechanism for bringing the country’s spiraling situation under control. The regime’s security calculations are unraveling.

The regime, meanwhile, continues to escalate its campaign of killings and executions, seeking to prevent the deepening crisis of daily survival, relentless inflation, the shock of soaring prices, and the mounting psychological turmoil of society from erupting into the “final battle.” Iran is passing through days of profound consequence, even as the machinery of urban repression grows ever more intense. The regime’s ultimate nightmare — its deepest and most enduring fear — is a popular uprising. This regime, which kills its own people for daring to protest, will stop at no crime to preserve its rule and ensure its survival.

Erfan Fard is a counterterrorism analyst and Middle East studies researcher based in Washington, with a particular focus on Iran, Islamic terrorism, and ethnic conflicts in the region.