Just like Venezuela, Iran, too, is expendable for Russia

"The abduction of Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro by the United States military and the subsequent threats by Washington to intervene in Iran during its recent upheaval have generated a tide of enthusiasm in hawkish pro-Ukraine circles in the West. If Moscow's allies are weakened, then Russia also gets weaker, the simplistic logic goes. Although he criticised US interventionism in the past, US President Donald Trump is newly infected with the regime change fever once spread by his Democratic predecessors."

"What it reminds one of most is the export of revolution a short-lived policy of Soviet Russia spearheaded by the father of the Red Army, Leon Trotsky. It resulted in several pro-Bolshevik governments emerging across Europe in Hungary, Bavaria and Latvia. None of them lasted long. One of the Bolsheviks' lesser-known revolutionary projects was the Persian Soviet Socialist Republic, which existed in 1920-21 in Iran's Gilan province on the Caspian Sea."

"The idea was to try to spread the proletarian revolution all the way to India, but eventually the Red Army had to retreat, and its local allies were quickly overthrown. Fast-forward a century, and Iran again finds itself as a destination for revolutionary export, only now with American and Israeli hawks behind the attempt to foment something along the lines of Ukraine's Maidan."

Moscow is focused on winning in Ukraine and treats other geopolitical actions as means to that end. The abduction of Nicolas Maduro and US threats to intervene in Iran have energized hawkish pro-Ukraine factions that view weakening Moscow's allies as weakening Russia. US President Donald Trump has adopted regime-change impulses similar to earlier administrations. Historical Soviet attempts to export revolution, such as the 1920-21 Persian Soviet Socialist Republic in Gilan, failed quickly. Contemporary efforts to foment uprisings in Iran, aided by American and Israeli hawks, risk reinforcing Iranian resistance due to fears of foreign intervention and destabilizing transformations.

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