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The signs are that Iran is going to face intensified hostility from the U.S. over the next year for regime change.

The sudden fall of Syria and the isolation of Hezbollah in Lebanon – Iran’s regional allies – have made Tehran look vulnerable.

Anti-Iran hawks in the U.S. are cock-a-hoop about the prospect of regime change in Tehran.

The recent death of Jimmy Carter at the age of 100 puts in perspective how great a prize the Islamic Republic represents for Washington’s imperial desires. Carter was disparaged as the American president who lost Iran in 1979 as a crucial client state for U.S. power in the Middle East.

For over four decades, American imperialist power has sought to topple the Islamic Republic and return the Persian nation to the U.S. global fold.

Though, as U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken lamented last month, American “regime change experiments” in Iran have been a failure.

Now, however, there is renewed enthusiasm in Washington for the Persian prize.

The lust for regime change in Tehran has peaked with the dramatic fall of President al-Assad in Syria.

American lawmakers and Iranian exiles are publicly calling for the new Trump administration to get back to its maximum pressure campaign on Tehran because they believe there is “a perfect moment” for regime change.

During Donald Trump’s first White House (2017-2021), he revoked the Iranian nuclear deal of the Obama administration and ramped up economic sanctions in what was referred to as a policy of “maximum pressure.”

A growing chorus of Republicans and Democrats are urging the United States to seize the opportunity of a perceived weakened Iran to overthrow the clerical rule of Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.

At a recent forum in Washington, it was reported that speaker after speaker brayed for regime change in Tehran. For years, such a desire had been dulled with U.S. failure and the formidableness of the Islamic Republic.

“We have an obligation to stand together with allies in making sure this regime’s suppression will come to an end,” said Democratic Senator Cory Booker.

“Iran is projecting only weakness,” declared Jeanne Shaheen, another Democratic Senator.

Republican Senator Ted Cruz sounded vindicated over his long-time anti-Iran stance: “I have, for a long time, been willing to call quite unequivocally for regime change in Iran… The ayatollah will fall, the mullahs will fall, and we will see free and democratic elections in Iran. Change is coming, and it’s coming very soon.”

James Jones, a former White House national security adviser, said: “The tectonic shift in the Syrian government… should mean to the people of Iran that change is in fact possible in the Middle East.”

The Islamic Revolution in 1979 deposed Shah Pahlavi, an ardent American client. The revolution and the hostage crisis at the U.S. embassy in Tehran was a horrible blow to Washington’s global image. The Shah had been brought to power by the U.S.-British coup in 1953 and for 26 years, the dictatorial monarch ruled with an iron fist as a loyal and massive buyer of American weaponry and supplier of oil profits.

The overthrow of the Shah put Iran in the crosshairs for regime change. The Americans prompted the Iraq-Iran War between 1980 and 1988. The new Islamic rulers were subjected to crippling economic sanctions, which were eased in 2015 with the signing of the Iran nuclear deal brokered by the Obama administration. By then, the U.S. was trying a softer policy of regime change and limited engagement.

Trump abandoned that policy, reverting to a more hostile one. Trump ordered the assassination of Iran’s top military commander Major General Qassem Soleimani on January 3, 2020.

Trump can be expected to make Iran his foreign policy goal during the first year of his second administration beginning on January 20.

There is a giddy sense that the U.S.-backed Israeli war on Gaza, Lebanon and Yemen has fatally weakened the Islamic Republic.

During his election campaign, Trump endorsed Israeli plans to attack Iran’s nuclear sites militarily.

Trump will be tempted that Iran could be an early success for his political legacy. To overthrow the Iranian government and replace it with a pro-U.S. regime would be the prize of the century for the American imperial ego.

There is also the imperative of geo-strategy. Russia, China and Iran have emerged as an important alternative geopolitical axis that is perceived as a threat to U.S. global power and the American dollar hegemony. Iran appears to be the weakest link among the opposing bloc, known as the BRICS.

Trump seems to be prioritizing making a peace settlement in Ukraine with Russia. Part of that calculation is incentivized by freeing up U.S. resources to target Iran.

Last year, the imperialist Atlantic Council published an article headlined: “The United States needs a new Iran policy – and it involves regime change, but not the traditional kind”.

The Atlantic Council article advocated intensified economic and political pressure on Iran and internal destabilization by the covert backing of Iranian opposition groups. We can expect a turbo-charged color revolution in Iran, with Western media amplifying public protests against the authorities. Also recommended by the Atlantic Council: “Propaganda efforts to drive a wedge between Russia and Iran, as well as undermine its support by the rank-and-file within the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) and military, would also help weaken the regime.”

The year ahead is shaping up for a mammoth effort by the U.S. to target Iran.

Suddenly, the U.S. imperial regime-change machine has found the driving seat again after years of sputtering failure in Iran and Syria. The victory of CIA proxies in Syria to finally overthrow Assad is producing a rush to do the same in Iran. That prize seemed out of reach for too long. A new American president and a new Middle East configuration have brought Iran back into the crosshairs for regime change with an intoxicating vengeance.