Fox News hosts Sean Hannity, Brian Kilmeade, and Jesse Watters have suggested flooding Iran with small arms to incite regime change, a reckless proposal that even some of their guests have rejected.
The United States and Israel last week launched an unprovoked war on Iran with shifting stated goals, one of which is regime change — or, perhaps more accurately, regime collapse. That could take several forms, including a mass uprising of the population in Iran or possibly the introduction of proxy forces, such as Kurdish militias, whom the CIA is reportedly working to arm. (The United States has a decadeslong history of encouraging Kurds across several countries to rise up and then betraying them.)
The risks of such a development are numerous, the most obvious being the threat of sending Iran into a spiral of violence that could turn into a civil war like in Syria after the Arab Spring or Iraq during the U.S. occupation. The United States poured weapons into both of those countries, helping to fuel the violence and worsen the internal conflicts.
Although such an outcome would appear disastrous on its face, there is ample evidence that the United States and Israel want to turn Iran from a regional power into a failed state incapable of countering their influence. Flooding the country with weapons could do that, and Fox News personalities are leading the charge.
Host Sean Hannity is the network’s most vocal supporter of the idea, both on his Fox prime-time show and on his radio program, which airs on Premiere Radio Networks.
“I already know” that arming Iranians is “part of the plan,” Hannity said on his March 2 radio show, telling a caller that “if you have millions of Iranians that, in fact, do have weapons and they rise up against the remnants of this regime — and there's not a lot — or for those Revolutionary Guard forces that will not put their weapons down, there's only one way to get rid of them.” (Whether Hannity’s claim to “already know” President Donald Trump’s war plans was bluster or not, the administration has been leaking insider information to its allies in right-wing media.)
Hannity returned to the topic several times during that show. “The Iranian people need to have elections, and they need to get armed, and they need to be able to fight back” against the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, he said. Later, he added, “I’m hoping that the students, the people in Iran, I’m hoping that they get the arms for any remaining Revolutionary Guard forces that won't lay down their weaponry.”
“You can't win a revolution with a slingshot — at some point they are going to need to be armed to take out the remaining loyalists,” he said the following day.
That evening, Hannity broached the idea on his Fox show during an interview with network contributor and retired Army Gen. Jack Keane, one of the war’s most vocal cheerleaders outside the Trump administration.
“Do we need to arm the civilians that had taken to the streets, that were being mowed down by the tens of thousands?” Hannity asked.
“In terms of arming the people themselves, I would pause on doing that,” Keane said. “I wouldn’t rush into that.” He added, “I don’t think just arming them and creating that — upgunning that level of violence is what we need.”