April 21, 2026 The officer in Iran’s riot police force said that since U.S.-Israeli airstrikes began on February 28, his phone number had changed six times and that each week a new superior would arrive and then vanish. “They go elsewhere and new people come in,” he said. “And all the commanders keep changing their houses.” Many of his fellow officers had been killed in the bombardments, he said, and a soldier he knew had his legs blown off when his barracks were bombed. “We are all broken,” he said. “To be honest, we’re all angry, and what’s more, we’re afraid to stay in our posts. We’re more spread out now in public places such as hospitals or malls. Hardly anyone remains on military bases anymore — no more than one or two people.” It was mid-April, days after a fragile ceasefire had taken effect. I had been corresponding with the officer, a member of the Kurdish minority in western Iran, since early January. He had agreed to answer questions from me, but only through written hand-delivered messages — and only on condition of anonymity, out of fear of the regime’s retaliation. “Send me your questions,” I was instructed by our intermediary, a close friend who knew the officer and his family. “I’ll have a trusted contact deliver them in person.” I messaged my questions, then waited with some skepticism. Authorities were bracing for a sharp escalation in anti-regime protests across the country, and I did not expect an officer who would likely be tasked with repressing them to reply, let alone to provide a candid account. Yet the officer went on to respond to my questions three times over several weeks. Each set of his answers chronicled a deepening disillusionment and desperation with his profession — and the regime. His is a rare perspective of the turbulent months at the start of the year: the nationwide unrest in January, the bloody crackdown that followed, and the war — as he tried to navigate a command structure that he said viewed Kurdish members like him with suspicion. January 7, 2026: Under Stress and “on Standby” In the first week of January, protests that had begun as an outcry against a cratering economy were rapidly evolving into a nationwide uprising. Protesters started demanding the wholesale dismantling of the theocratic regime that has ruled Iran since the Revolution of 1979. Sensing the momentum, opposition groups and the exiled son of Iran’s late shah began calling on Iranians to march en masse on January 8. Security forces had been relying mostly on tear gas, birdshot, and mass arrests to break up crowds. Yet blunt warnings from the regime — notably Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei’s declaration that “rioters must be put in their place” — foreshadowed a turn toward lethal force. In previous rounds of unrest — from the student protests in 1999 and the Green Movement in 2009 to the nationwide demonstrations in 2017 and 2019 and the “Woman, Life, Freedom” uprising in 2022 — primary responsibility for suppressing dissent had fallen to a multilayered security apparatus. This includes the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps; its subordinate, volunteer Basij paramilitary; the Ministry of Intelligence; and the riot police, known as the Special Units, or Yegan-e Vizheh. The Special Units are a specialized force within FARAJA, Iran’s law enforcement command, distinguishable by their green fatigues and helmets (or in the case of their elite anti-terror unit, all black uniforms and balaclavas), as well as their SUVs and armored vehicles, As Brigadier General Hassan Karami, a former commander of the units, once explained, these forces are deployed when regular law enforcement “cannot calm the situation and unrest spreads.” Operating at both the national and provincial levels, the Special Units maintained at least 60,000 deployable personnel in 2013, according to FARAJA’s commander. While commanders claim that the forces rely mostly on water cannons, batons, and shields to disperse crowds, in recent years they have been increasingly documented opening fire on civilians with metal birdshot, Kalashnikovs, sniper rifles, and DShK heavy machine guns, according to security analysts and news outlets such as IranWire. 
“I have received his answers,” our intermediary messaged me on Wednesday, January 7. The courier had returned from meeting the officer, carrying his written responses. “We have been told to be fully on standby for tomorrow” read one reply. “There is a lot of disagreement now among security forces” over whether a harsh crackdown would restore order or further fuel public fury, the officer said. “There is 100% confusion” within the Special Units. Key decisions were being made in closed-door meetings and withheld from officers like him, he said. “I don’t know what’s happening,” adding that “upstairs” the “management” were almost all Shiite Muslim, while he and his counterparts were members of Iran’s minority Sunni Muslim community. “They’re doing things in secret, and we’re afraid of what’s coming.” “There is chaos everywhere, in the city, in homes, in the streets, and within the police forces, too,” he added. “I know all the officers in my station, and they believe the regime is collapsing.” And he continued: “We don’t have permission to use live ammunition yet, unless an order comes . . . that you can go ahead and shoot. If they feel there’s a big possibility of [regime] collapse, there’s a higher likelihood we’ll be told to shoot to kill.” Many of his fellow officers and soldiers, he said, were under intense stress. “My own family is urging me to take off my uniform and leave this job because they’re all against the regime,” the officer said, adding that he was “strongly against” using deadly force to confront protesters. “I have not been able to kill a single sheep in my life. I’m in the police force for the income — not to kill people.” He said he feared the moment his commanders might order live fire. “If I disobey,” he wrote, “they’ll kill me.” On Thursday, January 8, as the journalist Fatemeh Jamalpour
Interviews with the Riot Police in Iran
