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Iran's IRGC declares victory and courts war-weary Americans with a 26-page appeal full of manipulative propaganda

By ljdevon // 2026-10-01

Americans are growing more wary of the Iran war by the day, and the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps are finding an opportunity to conquer-and-divide America further using psychological manipulation tactics. Their latest 26-page letter to the American people invokes "Jesus" to appeal to American Christian culture, while making the case for the American people to oppose their own government. While some of their grievances from this war are documented in the letter, the message omits grievances committed against the US and other countries and peoples over the years, including deadly grievances committed against their own people. The Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps wants Americans to see Iran as a wounded friend - a victim of the US and Israeli governments - rather than a hostile power with its own rap sheet of human rights abuses. Its 26-page open letter, addressed to American scholars, students and journalists, declares that Iran won a war the United States and Israel started. The truth is: no one is going to win this war and this thing didn't begin this year. The letter then asks ordinary American citizens to stand beside Tehran against their own leaders. Beneath the cherry-picked scripture, the victimhood grief, and their finely curated list of historical grievances, lies a calculated influence operation, an operation built to pry apart an already divided country along every fracture line. Americans can acknowledge the real selected history the letter cites while refusing to be played by what it buries: the IRGC's own record, Iran's enmity toward Israel, unanswered nuclear questions, and a chant that still wishes death upon America. Key points:

• The IRGC claims victory while the letter itself lists more than 3,600 Iranian dead, bombed universities and a slain Supreme Leader.
• Its battlefield tallies are unverified assertions, and some rest on the word "reportedly."
• The letter courts the left, the right, academics, Christians and conspiracy-minded readers with separate messages, and the divide-and-conquer tactic it accuses Washington of using.
• It recasts "Death to America" as a prayer against elites, yet admits Americans empower their government with their votes.
• It claims the Guards never harmed civilians, ignoring the 2020 downing of a Ukrainian airliner that killed 176 people.
• It dismisses nuclear concerns without addressing International Atomic Energy Agency findings on enriched uranium and restricted inspections.

The IRGC is no ordinary army. Formed after the 1979 revolution to defend the Islamic Republic, it fields land, sea and air forces, runs a vast commercial empire and directs the Quds Force, which arms allied militias across the Middle East. Washington designated it a foreign terrorist organization in 2019. The letter says the current war began Feb. 28, 2026, with a strike on a Minab elementary school and the killing of Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, and it works hard to scrub that terrorist label. Its casualty counts and battlefield claims come from the Guards alone and cannot be independently confirmed. The casualties of innocents could also be the result of coward Iranian troops hiding behind the innocent and sacrificing them for Allah. This is common among Islamist extremists. To make matters worse, their letter tries to try to paint Jesus, God, and Allah on equal spiritual footing; however, the Islamic Republic routinely rejects the message of Jesus Christ and instead commits heinous acts of violence in the name of Allah.

A victory speech written in the grammar of defeat

By the letter's own account, more than 3,600 Iranians have died, eight universities, three hospitals and eight schools have been bombed, and the Supreme Leader was killed. It also cites an "Islamabad Memorandum of Understanding" between the Iranian and American presidents, which sounds less like a vanquished superpower and more like talks between exhausted combatants. Claims that 18 U.S. bases were reduced to "nearly zero" capability, that 30 fighter jets were destroyed, and that American personnel were "reportedly running around in their underwear" arrive without verifiable evidence. Hearsay dressed as triumph is still hearsay. The unity narrative has cracks of its own. The letter says CIA and Mossad agents turned "peaceful demonstrations" in January 2026 into clashes that killed more than 2,300 Iranians, then boasts of national solidarity. Blaming foreign hands for domestic anger is the oldest reflex of embattled states. The letter never mentions the 2019 fuel-price protests, which Reuters reported left about 1,500 dead, citing Interior Ministry sources. It mocks President Donald Trump for placing relatives in diplomatic roles, yet presents the elevation of Mujtaba Khamenei, son of the slain leader, as the triumph of righteous governance. Its claim that the leader is chosen by jurists "appointed directly by the people" skips the Guardian Council's vetting of who may run. Iran is not some holy bastion of democracy, as their letter tries hard to convince.

Many masks, one agenda

The letter accuses American elites of "divide and conquer" while practicing it with surgical precision. The letter obviously uses super-intelligence to gather information online and synthesize it in a way to manipulate different demographics of thought in America. Progressives are manipulated by references to Gaza, slavery, the treatment of Native Americans, praise for the "No Kings" rallies and a salute to Aaron Bushnell, the airman who set himself on fire outside the Israeli Embassy. Conservatives and liberterians are manipulated with reference to the 800 overseas bases, the national debt, tariff whiplash and warnings of Third World decline. Academics are urged to refuse military research. Christians are courted with Jesus Christ and the Golden Rule. Conspiracy-minded readers get a wink at September 11 as a possible "false-flag operation" and a claim that Washington created ISIS. Every audience hears what it already suspects, which is the craft of propaganda. Then comes the slogan itself. The letter insists "Death to America" means "Death to the crimes perpetrated by the American elite," and calls it "a prayer for the eradication of the diabolical ruling elite." Yet the same pages label the White House "the House of Oppression," brand dissenting Iranians as people who "sold their soul to the devil," and later scold Americans with the line "You are the ones who empower, with your votes, the government." Victims do not elect their oppressors, and the letter cannot have it both ways. The friendly tone also sits beside explicit menace. The letter warns that popular anger will "set fire to all of America's interests and assets throughout the world," and says God "wishes to drown the Pharaoh of our age, and He will." A peace offer that arrives with a prophecy of drowning is a hostage negotiation conducted in reverse. On Israel, the letter drops all pretense of narrow grievance. It says occupiers "will, sooner or later, have to leave the land they occupy and return to their countries of origin" and predicts "Soon, Palestine will be liberated." Its account of Gaza begins with an Israeli offensive in October 2023 and never mentions the Hamas attack that came first, nor Iran's long record of arming Hamas, Hezbollah and the Houthis. Phrases like "Zionist capitalists" and "Zionist masters of global finance" recycle an old trope about hidden financial puppeteers. Americans may legitimately debate roughly $3.8 billion in annual military aid, but calling for the removal of a nation's citizens is another matter. The nuclear section leans on a fair point: American officials have warned for 25 years that Iran was only months or weeks from a bomb, and the Iraq weapons claims collapsed. But it concludes Iran has no program while omitting what the International Atomic Energy Agency has reported, including a stockpile of uranium enriched to 60 percent purity, which nonproliferation experts say far exceeds civilian need, and curtailed inspector access. In June 2025, the agency's board found Iran in violation of its safeguards obligations. U.S. intelligence has said Tehran had not decided to build a weapon, but capability is what keeps Israel awake. The letter's reassurance rests on a religious ruling against nuclear arms whose binding force analysts dispute. The grievance list is real in places and selective in others. The 1953 coup that toppled Mohammad Mosaddegh and the 1988 downing of Iran Air Flight 655, which killed 290 people, are documented. Yet the letter describes the seizure of the U.S. Embassy as closing a "Den of Espionage" and omits the 444 days that 52 Americans were held hostage. It skips the 1983 Beirut barracks bombing that killed 241 American service members, which U.S. courts attributed to Iran-backed Hezbollah, and the Iranian-supplied roadside bombs that killed American troops in Iraq. It insists there is "not a single verifiable instance" of IRGC violence against civilians, though the Guards shot down Ukraine International Airlines Flight 752 in January 2020, killing 176 people, after days of official denial. Even the olive branch is crafted. "We can live together in peaceful coexistence," the letter says, and in the next breath urges Americans to "Entrust your affairs to the wise, not the wily." Americans should keep asking why they maintain 800 bases, where the billions go and who profits from endless war. Those questions belong to citizens, not to a regime whose security forces have repeatedly fired on their own people and whose chant still calls for America's death. A genuine hand of peace would open its nuclear facilities to inspectors, halt proxy attacks and let its own citizens speak freely. Until then, the Guards are not offering friendship. They are offering a manipulative script to divide and conquer America and get people to doubt their faith. Sources include: X.com IRNA.ir [PDF] MSN.com

World War III Iran national security Israel propaganda Middle East twisted conspiracy big government deception lies chaos Strait of Hormuz Nuclear Program Quds Force death to America american politics open letter influence operation IRGC IAEA inspections war claims