Poor Marco Rubio. In addition to serving as President Donald Trump's near-sleepless Secretary of State, he's also Trump's acting National Security Advisor, and potential future U.S. Viceroy of Venezuela, Governor-General of Cuba, and Temporary Shah of Iran.
I kid. Mostly.
PJ Media's own Sarah Anderson has more later today on Rubio's role in transitioning Venezuela away from Chavismo now that Nicolás Maduro is in federal custody, so you won't want to miss that. Sarah also covered the resulting panic in Cuba's Communist government, and don't miss that, either.
But half a world away, our workaholic SecState must have at least one eye on continuing anti-regime violence in the Islamic Republic of Iran.
Before we get into this, let me say just two things.
The first is that I know better than to get my hopes up for a popular revolt overthrowing the Mullahs and ideally treating Ayatollah Khamenei to the Benito Mussolini Lamppost Retirement Plan. We've watched events just like today's play out before, and they didn't end well for the protestors.
The second is that I also recognize that "change" and "improve" are not synonyms. This is from a VIP-exclusive piece by PJ Media's own Rick Moran:
That's the key: "the Iranian public" will probably not have much of a say in a future Iran after the clerical fascists are gone. Even if the long-shot revolution leads to the government fleeing or being lined up against a wall, what follows may actually be worse.
"There is no centralized leadership to the current protest movement, and as the collapse of the Georgetown conference demonstrated, the diaspora opposition leaders and groups are more polarized than ever," writes [Middle East Forum's Michael] Rubin.
The realist prospect for the Islamic regime is that they murder enough of the country's young people in cold blood to quell the riots and stay in power.
But there are indications that the realist prospect might — repeat, might — not hold. The first might be an intelligence report confirmed by The Times (UK) that "Khamenei plans to flee to Moscow if Iran unrest intensifies."
“The ‘plan B’ is for Khamenei and his very close circle of associates and family, including his son and nominated heir apparent, Mojtaba,” the paper's intel source revealed. Obviously, that's Plan B. But two weeks ago, it was probably the D- or E-level plan.
The report continues: "The getaway plan is based on the escape of his ally, the fallen Syrian leader Bashar al-Assad who fled Damascus aboard a plane to Moscow to join his family before opposition forces stormed the capital in December 2024," which virtually nobody saw coming, either. So who knows?
Another report made the rounds over the weekend:
The Islamic Regime is nervous.
— The Mossad: Satirical and Awesome (@TheMossadIL) January 2, 2026
A leaked confidential Central Bank directive tells Iran’s banks to prepare for power failures, SMS shutdowns, cyber disruption, and operating without centralized control.
When dictators get nervous, they don’t issue speeches. They issue memos.… pic.twitter.com/tliL0qRhx6
The memo is confirmed real, by the way. The "Mossad" account is satirical, but it isn't always joking.
But again, these are just plans, not events. Just because the regime is ready to do something, whether it's shutting down the banking system or high-tailing it to Moscow, doesn't mean these things are about to happen.
Still, it's best to have a plan.
One reason — aside from all the murder — previous anti-regime riots petered out is, as Rubin pointed out, there was no central figure or cause for protestors to organize and rally around. Maybe exiled Crown Prince of Iran, Reza Pahlavi, could serve as a centralizing figurehead for the various opposition groups, but Pahlavi would have to become much more assertive than he's been to date.
Still, I look at Pahlavi sometimes and think of Spain's King Juan Carlos I, who served as an apolitical figurehead to smooth the transition to democracy from Francisco Franco's authoritarian regime.
But hope, as they say, is not a plan.
Enter, stage right: Our overworked SecState, Marco Rubio.
How many rifles in the hands of protestors might it take to convince the Ayatollah's security forces — used to acting with complete impunity — that it would be best to stay home in civilian clothes and watch events unfold on TV?
"Not many" is my first guess. "But a few more wouldn't hurt."
Flight tracking data and OSINT observers on X report multiple USAF C-17 missions from Europe to bases like Al Udeid in Qatar and Azraq in Jordan. About half a dozen "round-robin" or heavy lift flights have occurred since just Saturday, indicating… well, we don’t really know, do we?
Could be something, might very well be nothing.
But this is an administration — and a particularly muscular State Department — that holds its cards close, right up until it lays down a winning hand.
Recommended: Trump's Entire Foreign Policy in Just Six Words
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