Lipstick on the IRGC: why Ghalibaf must not be rebranded as a pragmatist
Mehdi Parpanchi
Iran International executive editor
Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf may soon be called a pragmatist. That would be a mistake.
Iran International executive editor
Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf may soon be called a pragmatist. That would be a mistake.
The Rebrand Begins
The pattern is familiar. When Ali Larijani was killed in an Israeli strike last week, some Western coverage quickly reached for the usual labels: practical, moderate, easier to work with than the other men around him. Ghalibaf may now be next. He is now the most senior surviving figure in the Islamic Republic with deep IRGC roots. That puts him in a dangerous and important position. He could become the next major assassination target. He could also be sold as a channel to the West in a system that increasingly looks like an IRGC republic.
At the very moment that reports are emerging of further U.S. military steps around Iran, there are also reports that JD Vance may soon meet senior regime figures. Ghalibaf may be one of them. We do not know whether those reports are true, whether any such contact will take place, or who exactly would be involved. No name has been officially confirmed. But if such a meeting does happen, it may prove clarifying. Vance belongs to the isolationist wing of the Trump administration. A meeting with Ghalibaf or another senior regime figure would give Vance a direct look at who actually holds power in Iran and the kind of men the administration would be dealing with. That could matter if the war deepens and the isolationist wing has to judge the regime more directly.
As I argued in an earlier piece, ambiguity about potential contacts is already doing political work, unsettling senior officials in Iran as they wonder who may be talking to Washington. This piece makes a different point. The same ambiguity can also create openings for the wrong kind of figure to be misread as a moderate or a usable channel.
But Ghalibaf is not a moderate. He is not a hidden reformer. He is not a practical man trapped inside an ideological state. He is a hardliner, corrupt to the bone, who has spent years trying to look like something else.
Ghalibaf has always been ambitious. He once cast himself as the Islamic Republic’s version of a modernising strongman, even using the language of an “Islamic Reza Khan.” He wanted the presidency and, for years, carried himself like Iran’s next president. He ran in four presidential elections after 2005. Around him, that ambition produced a political project: to present Ghalibaf not as just another insider, but as the man who could impose order after Khamenei.
That image was built not only for domestic politics. It was built for foreign eyes too.
How the image was built
Inside the system, Ghalibaf is a hardliner and a loyal product of the regime. Outside that circle, especially in private meetings and foreign-facing conversations, he has long tried to present himself as more modern, more practical, more disciplined, and less ideological than the Islamic Republic’s usual faces. He has tried to market himself as the man who could keep the system in place while making it easier for the outside world to deal with.
By mid-2024, that effort was already visible. On June 10, IranWire reported that people presenting themselves as Ghalibaf’s advisers had spent the previous two weeks approaching European and American diplomats with a clear message: Iran would need a strongman after Khamenei, and that strongman should be Ghalibaf. A European diplomat quoted in the report said they were presenting him as the only figure with the authority and connections to contain factional conflict, restore order, improve Iran’s foreign relations, and “cleanse” the regime of radical elements. The diplomat added that academics and think tank figures in Europe and the United States were also involved, suggesting a broader effort to persuade Western officials that Ghalibaf was not merely a candidate, but a future leader they should start accepting now.
My own sources point in the same direction. One source who was in the room told me that, in a meeting with European politicians in a European capital a few years before the IranWire report, Ghalibaf was plainly marketing himself as the kind of Islamic Republic figure the West could do business with after Khamenei. He was not presenting himself as an opponent of the regime. He was presenting himself as a more polished custodian of it: strong enough to control the system at home, but measured enough to speak to foreign capitals abroad.
There was another reason this belief took root. People familiar with the matter say Ghalibaf saw his absence from U.S. sanctions lists as a form of distinction, as if Washington treated him differently from other senior figures in the Islamic Republic. According to those familiar with the issue, the explanation was technical and legal rather than political, particularly because of his role as speaker of parliament. Even so, the coincidence seems to have had a real political effect. It fed his belief that he was seen abroad as a more acceptable and more usable figure than others in the system.
According to sources inside Iran, this also made parts of the regime suspicious of him. Some in the intelligence apparatus viewed his unsanctioned status with distrust and asked why a man of his seniority had escaped measures imposed on others. His ability to travel to the West only added to that unease. Ghalibaf is a pilot and, according to these sources, has at times flown aircraft himself, including on trips to London to keep his pilot credentials current. That too strengthened the sense among some insiders that he occupied an unusual place in the regime’s external profile.
The Record Behind the Image
But the image collapses the moment one looks at the record.
Ghalibaf is not a reformer held back by the system. He is one of its purest products. He rose through the Revolutionary Guards, the police, the municipality, and the institutions that sustain power in the Islamic Republic. His name is tied not only to hardline politics but also to repression, corruption, and elite hypocrisy.
For many Iranians, his role in repression has made him one of the most hated faces of the Islamic Republic. He is linked not only to the student crackdowns but also to the coercive institutions that kept the system alive through fear and force.
His corruption record is just as important. His years as mayor of Tehran are tied to some of the best-known scandals of that period, including the “astronomical properties” affair and the wider Yas Holding and Isa Sharifi case. These were not minor accusations at the edge of his career. They became part of the political meaning of his name.
The family scandals tell the same story. “Sismoni-gate” was politically damaging not because it was the gravest case against him, but because it exposed the hypocrisy of the ruling class. While the regime preached sacrifice and resistance, members of Ghalibaf’s family were seen shopping in Turkey for baby goods. Later came the embarrassment over his son’s attempt to secure permanent residence in Canada. These episodes confirmed a familiar pattern: the men who speak in the language of endurance often arrange private exits for their own families.
Why the West Should Resist the Script
That is why the current moment matters.
As war and decapitation strikes have thinned the Islamic Republic’s upper ranks, Ghalibaf has moved closer to the centre of power. Reports have suggested that he may have been involved in contacts with Washington. He has publicly denied that. He called the reports fake news and rejected any suggestion that negotiations had taken place.
But the deeper point is not whether he is lying or whether the reports are true in full. The deeper point is that his name surfaced so quickly at all. Whether Ghalibaf is really involved is almost secondary. He is exactly the kind of figure around whom such speculation gathers: a hardliner who has spent years trying to present himself as more practical, more modern, and more internationally legible than the rest of the ruling class. That makes him a natural target for rumour, whether or not he is the actual channel.
And that is the danger.
In moments of crisis, some in the West begin looking again for a hard man they can call practical. Faced with chaos in Tehran, they search for someone tough enough to control the machine but polished enough to sound like a statesman. Ghalibaf has spent years preparing for that role. He has tried to look like the man who could preserve the system while making it more manageable for outsiders.
But he is not a post-Khamenei solution. He is a distilled product of the Khamenei system.
Before anyone in the West starts calling him a pragmatist, it is worth remembering what he really is.
He is one of the clearest expressions of the Islamic Republic, and one of its most hated figures in the eyes of the Iranian public. That public is not a bystander here. Less than three months ago, Iranians gave more than 30,000 lives in resistance to the same oppressive system that Ghalibaf stands at the heart of. Anyone thinking of dealing with him should remember that.
And that is the point to make now, before the rebranding begins.
