For decades, international debates about Iran’s nuclear ambitions have relied on a familiar assumption: that nuclear deterrence works because states ultimately behave rationally when faced with existential consequences.
This logic may hold when applied to governments that see their own populations as political stakeholders. It becomes far more fragile when applied to a regime that has repeatedly demonstrated its willingness to use mass violence against its own unarmed citizens in order to survive.
The Islamic Republic of Iran has established a clear internal pattern. Large-scale repression, the systematic use of lethal force against protesters, mass arrests, and the absence of accountability are not exceptions but structural features of governance. Power is maintained not through consent, but through fear. The institutions responsible for this repression—most notably the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC)—operate with near-total impunity.
This internal behavior is not disconnected from Iran’s external conduct. On the contrary, it is a reliable indicator of how the regime approaches power beyond its borders. A political system that perceives its own society as an existential threat is unlikely to develop restraint once endowed with weapons of unprecedented destructive capacity. The assumption that such a system would suddenly become predictable under nuclear deterrence deserves serious scrutiny.
The IRGC plays a central role in linking domestic repression with external projection of power. It is not merely a military force, but a hybrid structure combining intelligence operations, economic control, ideological enforcement, and regional intervention. Its activities span from supporting armed proxies across the Middle East to engaging in intimidation and surveillance of dissidents in Europe. These are not isolated actions; they reflect a coherent strategy designed to secure regime survival at all costs.
Europe is not insulated from these dynamics. Iranian-linked networks have been repeatedly identified as posing security risks within European societies, particularly to political opponents, journalists, and activists living in exile. Transnational repression—through threats, coercion, and intimidation—has become a defining feature of the regime’s external behavior. This challenges the long-standing European tendency to compartmentalise Iran’s internal repression and its foreign policy ambitions.
Germany’s evolving stance reflects a growing recognition of this reality. The debate within the European Union about designating the IRGC as a terrorist organisation marks a significant shift in perception. It signals an understanding that the IRGC is not merely a foreign military entity, but a central instrument of repression and destabilisation. Germany’s decision to shut down institutions linked to Iranian state influence, such as the Islamic Center Hamburg, further underscores this reassessment.
Yet these steps, while important, remain incomplete. As long as the regime’s core power structures remain intact and unchallenged, the risks associated with Iran’s nuclear ambitions cannot be treated as abstract or manageable. The issue is not simply the possession of advanced weapons or long-range missiles, but the nature of the authority that controls them.
Iran’s approach to strategic chokepoints such as the Strait of Hormuz illustrates this danger. The repeated use of maritime threats as political leverage demonstrates a readiness to instrumentalise global economic vulnerability for strategic gain. Combined with nuclear capability, such behavior would fundamentally alter the global security calculus, particularly for Europe, which remains heavily dependent on stable energy routes.
The central question facing policymakers is therefore not whether Iran can be deterred in theory, but whether deterrence can function when applied to a regime that fears its own population more than international retaliation. History suggests that systems built on internal terror tend to externalise risk rather than contain it.
Preventing nuclear proliferation in Iran is thus not only a matter of arms control, but of political realism. It requires acknowledging that internal repression and external aggression are not separate policy domains, but two expressions of the same survival logic. Ignoring this connection risks repeating the same strategic miscalculations that have already destabilised entire regions.
The real danger posed by Iran’s nuclear ambitions lies not in technology alone, but in the character of the regime that seeks to control it.
