The CIA is preparing to arm Kurdish forces to incite an uprising against the Iranian government, according to reports.
US officials have held talks with Iranian opposition groups and with Kurdish leaders in Iraq to provide them with military support to help overthrow the Islamic Republic, several sources told CNN.
The plan would involve Kurdish militias taking part in a ground operation in western Iran in the coming days, a senior Iranian Kurdish official said.
“We believe there is a big chance now,” the source told the American broadcaster. The militias are expected to be aided by both US and Israeli support.
Kurdish militants would attack Iranian security forces, enabling Iran’s anti-government protesters and rebels to take to the streets, a source explained.
A US official said the Kurds would be used to help sow chaos and distraction in the region, stretching the Iranian military’s resources away from its retaliatory attacks on US bases in surrounding countries, and weakening it.
Other plans include the possibility of the group holding an area in the northern part of Iran to serve as a buffer zone for Israel.
But the strategy is not without risk.
“It may not be as simple as Americans convincing a proxy force to fight on its behalf,” a Trump administration official said.
“You have a group of people who are thinking about their own interests, and the question is whether getting them involved aligns with their interests.”
Kurdish forces operate along the border of Iraq and Iran and have historically opposed the Islamic Republic. They are an ethnic minority group without a state at present, although their population of 25-30 million people stretches across Turkey, Iraq, Syria, Iran and Armenia.
The US supported the group in Iraq in their 1991 revolt against the government before they were abandoned and left to face backlash by Saddam Hussein’s forces. Washington implemented a no-fly zone, which eventually allowed the minority to govern a semi-autonomous territory in northern Iraq.
They were armed and supported by the US in Syria and make up a major portion of the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), but were abandoned again after America backed the government of Ahmed al-Sharaa who took control in December 2024. The new government introduced rights protecting the Kurds.
Turkey considers the SDF an extension of the Kurdistan Workers’ Party, which is proscribed as a terrorist organisation in the country. It only recently ended its armed insurgency in the country after four decades.
Chatham House expert Neil Quilliam warned Washington’s decision could prove to be major concern for countries in the region.
The move would add to unrest caused by other armed groups such as Hezbollah, who are already operating in the region to avenge the death of Ayatollah Ali Khamenei with strikes on Israel.
On Sunday, US president Donald Trump called Iraqi Kurdish leaders to discuss the US-Israeli strikes on Iran and offered options on working together, two US officials and a third person familiar with the talks told Axios.
By Tuesday, Mr Trump had spoken with the president of the Democratic Party of Iranian Kurdistan (KDPI), Mustafa Hijri, according to a senior Iranian Kurdish official.
The Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps has claimed responsibility for several attacks on Kurdish groups since the outbreak of war, including the KDPI. On Tuesday, it claimed it attacked Kurdish forces with dozens of drones.
After US-Israeli strikes killed Khamenei in his personal compound on Saturday, Mr Trump urged Iranians to “take over your government. It will be yours to take. This will probably be your only chance for a generation.”
With internet cut off in Iran, it is difficult to tell whether protesters heeded his call, but the Islamic Republic appears to remain intact. Thousands turned out for demonstrations in support of Khamenei, who is reported to be succeeded by his son Mojtaba Khamenei, a similarly anti-Western figure.
The new reports suggest that the US is “clearly attempting to jumpstart” a rebellion, Alex Plitsas, a CNN national security analyst and former senior Pentagon official under former president Barack Obama, told CNN.
“The Iranian people are generally unarmed as a whole and unless the security services collapse, it’ll be difficult for them to take over unless someone arms them.”
