Soleimani’s Ultimate Revenge

T Qassem Soleimani is a sobering blow for the Iranian regime. Soleimani embodied everything the regime wanted to project about itself—influence, ruthlessness, agility, confidence. He kept Iran’s enemies awake at night, and his theocratic masters sleeping soundly in a world of real and imagined threats at home and abroad. For years, Tehran’s leadership talked fatalistically about Soleimani as a “living martyr,” but it surely did not anticipate President Donald Trump’s audacious targeted killing. Now the Iranians will seek vengeance—methodical, cold-blooded, and nasty. They will look to avoid an all-out war with the United States that they cannot win. But they will also look to turn a tactical blow into a strategic boon. Unlike the Trump administration, which cannot reconcile its desire to get tough on Iran with its desire to leave the region altogether, the Iranian regime has