Regime change, as defined in the dictionary, means “the overthrow of a nation’s leadership.” More often than not, regime change is a covert effort by a foreign power to replace an odious government with one that better serves its own national interests. These objectives can include spreading democracy, advancing economic interests, or pushing back against Soviet influence. Unfortunately, most of these efforts fail to achieve their basic goals. They end up harming the foreign power’s reputation, bringing about blowback in unanticipated ways, and producing a higher likelihood of civil war and human rights violations.
In the case of the United States, it has had a mixed track record in its attempts to promote regime change. For example, it was a major factor in the overthrow of Argentine dictator Juan Perón, but that wasn’t enough to stop the rise of Pinochet and other brutal Chilean dictators. The United States also helped overthrow the anti-colonialist government of Mohammad Mossadegh in Iran in 1953, but that did little to slow down the rise of the Taliban and al-Qaeda.
The lesson is clear: Attempts to topple foreign governments usually do more harm than good. The idea that a foreign power can remove a government that is deeply unpopular with its people and replace it with one that is more in line with the foreign country’s interests sounds great in theory. But that is rarely the case in practice. As this article explains, the best approach is to encourage domestic opposition and pressure the government to make concessions instead of engaging in covert regime change operations.
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