Secretary Pompeo: “Iran Will Be Free, But Only by Those Who Have Sacrificed for Decades”

Staff WriterJanuary 10, 2025
Secretary Pompeo: “Iran Will Be Free, But Only by Those Who Have Sacrificed for Decades”
Former US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo speaks at an NCRI meeting on January 9, 2025

Former US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo speaks at an NCRI meeting on January 9, 2025
Written by
Shamsi Saadati

Former U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, speaking at the National Council of Resistance of Iran (NCRI) headquarters on January 9, praised the Iranian Resistance as a force capable of shaping the future of a free Iran. In his remarks, Pompeo described the regime’s current state as dire and its leadership as incapable of meeting the needs of the Iranian people.

“The Ayatollah has no prayer, no hope, no dream even of delivering prosperity to the Iranian people. He is no longer even capable of defending those who are willing to risk their lives for him and for his autocratic regime,” the former US Secretary of States said.

Reflecting on the Iranian economy and political climate, Pompeo added, “The Iranian economy came to a virtual shutdown, a standstill. It couldn’t provide enough fuel, gasoline, heat, simple things for the people, ordinary people’s lives.” He attributed the regime’s failures to its focus on sustaining proxy forces and radical theology rather than addressing the needs of its citizens.

Pompeo also underscored the resilience of the Iranian Resistance, noting, “Iran will be free, but only by those who have sacrificed for decades, who have paid the highest price, who have withstood massacres and imprisonments. It can only be freed by you.”

He concluded with a message of optimism, saying, “This is worthy because, in the end, human decency will triumph, and the Iranian people and the resistance that you all have led will lead us to the outcome about which we have all been dreaming and believing and working for all these years.”

The full script of Secretary Mike Pompeo’s speech follows:

Thank you for this wonderful warm greeting. It is always, so heartwarming for me to come to this place. As I drove in here this morning, in spite of the snow, I remembered all the beauty of this place, the specialty of the people here. You are also committed to seeing a free Iran. And I want to take a special moment to acknowledge the people watching this from far away from here.

Bless you all so very much. I think I speak for everyone who’s here today in this room when I say that this is a true moment of hope as you spoke about, Madam Rajavi. It is a time for optimism for the people of Iran.

I’ve seen this past year and it’s been demonstrated. The regime is undoubtedly at its weakest point. I say that knowing that it has always been weak, but we now can see it plainly, all of us, the world.

The Ayatollah has no prayer, no hope, no dream even of delivering prosperity to the Iranian people. He is no longer even capable of defending those who are willing to risk their lives for him and for his autocratic regime.

It was a very kind introduction. Thank you. I’m the 70th secretary of state. The world will soon have America’s 72nd Secretary of State with the turn of the Trump administration. I don’t speak for the administration.

It won’t take office yet for another handful of days, but I am confident that the pressure campaign that you referred to will begin to be reinstated, and it will be the beginning of the end to help the people of Iran and the malign regime and that this is in sight in Tehran today. They can see it too. The regime is real as well. And so for those of us here for those of us here, I think, today, the appropriate question is what will Iran look like?

I want to talk to you about what I believe the future can hold. And I think you all know this. I think you all know this in your heart. We should always begin to think about the future by remembering this recent past. We should discuss the events since I’ve just since I’ve been here last. It all unfolded so quickly. It’s been a most devastating year for the IRGC and the MOIS and the Ayatollah.

Remarks by Hon Mike Pompeo, 70th Secretary of State Paris, Jan 9, 2025
Look inside the regime. It’s a crisis. The 2022 uprising, brutally suppressed by a regime, was a turning point. It showed that the Iranian regime must come to an end.

Those deep problems that led to this uprising in 2022 have intensified greatly. You all have seen it. The world has seen it. The Europeans have seen it. Leadership in Asia has seen it. The whole world can see this.

Just a just a handful of weeks ago, the Iranian economy came to a virtual shutdown, a standstill. That’s remarkable. It couldn’t provide enough fuel, gasoline, heat, or simple things for the people ordinary people’s lives.

The Iranian regime had to make choices, hard choices to choose between to heat the homes for the Iranian people or to keep small businesses running. That’s dysfunction of the highest order. Think about this. Think about this for just a moment. Iran is one of the most abundant energy-risk nations on the entire planet.

It’s blessed with things only the people of the world can only dream of in so many countries, yet it can’t provide energy for its own people. We know this. You know this. It’s not about what’s below the ground. It’s about what’s above the ground. Right? It’s that the Ayatollahs, Kronos care more about fomenting war against their enemies and their radical theology than they do about basic sustenance for their own people.

The problem isn’t one of resources. It’s a problem of accuracy and politics and a regime that is evil. It’s a regime that cares about enriching itself more than taking care of just the basic needs for its own people. Madam Rajavi spoke about its economy being in shambles. I think that’s very kind. I think it’s much worse than that.

The rial has lost 30% of its value in just the last 90 days. And no matter how much the regime wishes to project stability to the world or confidence in itself, you can’t ignore basic economics like that.

Politically, the situation is no better. The death of Raisi was an irreparable blow to the leader, to the Ayatollah himself. Raisi was a pillar. We all know his history as the Butcher of Tehran. He had heavily invested in Raisi, he had groomed Raisi to ensure that the regime would have continued set of policies when he passes from this world.

Raisi was installed with a sham election, widely boycotted by the vast majority of the Iranian people. And in the wake of his death, the regime held yet more sham presidential elections. And again, the Iranian people responded by boycotting, by not participating, by not granting the regime the basic dignity of having the people install the theocrat that he wanted to be installed.

They emphasized the illegitimacy of the Ayatollah and his government in their basic fundamental action of just saying, not me. I won’t show up.

So this crisis, this economic crisis, this political crisis, this crisis of basic character cannot be denied. We should all remember that Khamenei never sought to deliver a brighter future for the Iranian people that he claims to lead.

 

Both he and his predecessor took the wealth and resources that rightly belonged to those people and delivered to them instead of proxy forces around the world to protect the regime, to create conflict in other places so as not to allow anyone to see, people in the world to see what was really taking place.

And now it’s apparent that this has utterly failed. The past year has made this clear even to those people who didn’t believe this inside of my own country. They can see what has been wrought upon these proxy forces.

In Lebanon, Hezbollah was quickly reduced from what was perceived as a once powerful force to total impotence and, indeed, near nonexistence. What a blessing for the Iranian people and for the world.

Hezbollah is not even a shadow of what it once was. And the Ayatollah, was powerless to stop it. Hamas, on the verge of complete defeat and collapse in Gaza. Its leadership decimated. Its senior leaders gone, vanished.

And the leadership in Iran, impotent, unable to do anything to stop its demise. And most dramatically, the regime in Syria, that provided the inflow. This was the bridge between all of the Iranian proxy forces.

This regime that dropped chemical weapons on its own people and killed its own people with the full support of the leadership in Iran and which out which it couldn’t survive, no longer had two legs to stand on, and it is now gone, shattered.

Assad hiding in another country, hoping only that he can stay alive in spite of the crimes he committed against his own people. You know, I think that the fact that it fell so quickly, that it was such a paper tiger. And, I think this told the world that the Ayatollah is finished, that his time is complete. I think we can all see that this is devastating for someone like the Ayatollah.

In the past year, all the regime’s bluster about the extent of its power and influence has been revealed for what you all knew it was, a grand lie. You know, I want to take a moment.

I’m from the state of Kansas. You all wouldn’t know the story so well of The Wizard of Oz. It’s now famous for wicked. There was this man who sat in his chair and pretended to be the leader, but he was nothing.

 

He was nothing. The Ayatollah, the wizard in Iran, has now been revealed for what he truly is, a corrupt character who only rules by fear and terror. And that day, ladies and gentlemen, is quickly coming to an end.

There’s new leadership in many countries, many countries in Europe, there’ll be a new leader in Canada, and in just a few days, President Trump will return to office. He has talked a detail in detail about bringing back the Maximum Pressure Campaign that had proved so successful.

And this brings me to the point that this morning we should all consider in the days ahead. We can feel that the regime’s end is within reach. You all have contact with people who are living inside the country. They can feel it too. Whether it was the fall of Assad that showed that these dictatorships are just simply rotten to the core and that they seem invincible only until the moment that they break.

And we saw there too that much like with the communist regime in Europe, that these things happen quickly. They happen on the day that you don’t expect it. There is no plan which says in 37 days, this is going to happen. You’ll recall that back in 2013, Assad was close to falling. But at that time, Russia and the regime in Iran prevented its overthrow.

Tehran dispatched what was at the time, thousands and ultimately became tens of thousands of its proxy forces and its IRGC and Quds forces around the region to keep and protect Assad in power because they needed that to protect their own power. But, of course, the regime ran out of juice.

It ran out of power, character and decency as perceived in too many salons in Europe. They were prepared to negotiate with a leader who was on his last legs. I am confident that after January 20th, that will not happen again. The mayhem, the terror, and the chaos that sowed for decades became a massive liability that could not be prevented from falling due to the rate of its own corruption.

And this too will happen in Iran. And this is my message today to the Iranian people who have the opportunity to hear this and the Resistance Units that are fighting on behalf of all of us:

Keep up the fight. Keep your focus on the IRGC. The United States and the pressure campaign will return making the regime even more fragile. You, the Resistance, you are on the right path.

I love coming here because the energy reminds me of what we all know, that this solution, this positive change, you know, you can’t rely on the IRGC to moderate its ways. They will continue to be the repressive force that they are. No one is going to change the nature of that regime. Pretending so will only lead to the continuation of the rule of the clerics in Iran.

Iran will be free, but only by those who have sacrificed for decades, who have paid the highest price, and who have withstood massacres and imprisonments, it can only be freed by you. Bless you, all for the hard work you have done and the work in front of you.

What comes next? Syria’s experience showed the change requires a dedicated force on the ground and allies outside. Iran with its more extended history and its impressive organizational capabilities as a battle-tested force. The MEK has been confronting the regime for decades in Iran.

The MEK was the largest target of primary victims of 1988 in the massacre of 30,000 political prisoners inside of Iran. The MEK has been the target of terror abroad and the subject of massive demonization campaigns by the regime. Every week, in Friday prayer ceremony across Iran, the regime chants slogans against the resistance, and the regime’s propaganda machine calls them a terror cult.

I wouldn’t be here if that’s what it was. So sadly do thousands of parliamentarians across the world who don’t understand. But now I think we all know the truth. You all are freedom biters of the highest order.

In her speech on November 20th in the European Parliament, Madam Rajavi, not so long ago, you explained the roadmap for the regime’s end and in the transition period. The roadmap doesn’t count on Americans.

The roadmap counts on the Iranian people, the organized resistance network inside at its core and the Resistance Units throughout the country. These units must be and are the decisive force in the transformation that must be recognized.

And here I want to take a moment to make a crucial point. This plan does not demand regime change from outside, from the United States or others. It doesn’t ask for boots on the ground or even money from outside.

Mrs. Rajavi, you’ve repeatedly stated there’s only a single path, one path to the regime’s end, and that is being achieved by the Iranian people and the organized resistance inside of Iran.

 

The only demand is of the resistance is that the recognition of the Iranian people’s plight to bring about the end of the regime is proper. The right of the Resistance Units to combat the regime’s repressive forces, especially the IRGC. We and all the freedom-loving people must give them this recognition. Your Ten-Point Plan, Rajavi.

Your Ten-Point Plan includes free elections within six months, half a year of the regime’s overthrow. Separation of religion and state, gender equality, and a non-nuclear Iran. This deserves every nation’s support.

Mrs. Maryam Rajavi leads a democratic alternative that has demonstrated its capability over now 4 decades against the mullah’s dictatorship. Your movement has shown incredible capacity and resilience to end the regime’s brutality.

And you’ve exposed much of the regime’s nuclear sites, details around nuclear weapons and missile program, and the world owes great debt for all of this work, hard work.

The resistance has been willing to pay a very real and serious price. It has a platform that we can all support. And now it has garnered massive international support as well. New US policy as the new administration comes in needs to create even more space for the Iranian Resistance to be vigilant on the ground.

And the focal point of this policy has to be recognition of the Iranian people’s right to resist and to recognition of the National Council of Resistance of Iran as the single best alternative to the clerics that are ruling Iran.

You, the Iranian people, must be governed by those who are seeking a democratic free republic of Iran rather than this oppressive regime. I’m confident that we can get there.

I hope to return to Ashraf 3 before too long. And in doing so, I’m confident that I can further the rights of members, those living in Ashraf 3 in Albania, which I had the honor of visiting back in May of 2022. We can restore what is taking place there, which will help the resistance inside of the country. I am heartened by this morning.

And I want to close that this is the time for the West to recognize the rights of the Iranian people. This fundamental right that is so basic to every human being created in the image of God to live with human dignity.

And that means the right to resist and to change the nature of the lives of the people inside of Iran. You know this this country, Iran, is defined by those who for decades have paid this dear price of which I have spoken for years.

Indeed, indeed, I’ll never forget being shown a red-covered book when I visited Ashraf 3 on my last trip. Its pages contain the names of thousands of resistance fighters.

Many of you know them, some of them are family members of people in this very room and those of you watching from Ashraf 3 today.

These loved ones aren’t just numbers to you. They aren’t just names in a book. They’re the people who will deliver this free Iran. Bless you. Anytime I’m attacked for speaking your events, which happens, I am confident that the regime will respond to my remarks tomorrow. It won’t be very original, I suppose, but nonetheless. When I see that, what I think of is those names and the people that are living there.

I think of them because it reminds me that I, Mike, am doing the right thing for those people to honor their sacrifice and to create the opportunity for those who come along behind them.

This is worthy.

One last thought. This is worthy because it’s going to lead to an outcome for which you have all worked so hard for so many years. It is worthy because it is the right thing for all of the Iranian people. It is worthy because it will, in the end, create the capacity to hold accountable the slaughterers, the indecent, those who have committed such atrocities and such whores.

It is worthy because what we’ve seen take place in these last months throughout the region, the absolute clarity this has shown about the devastatingly weak regime. It is worthy because in the end, human decency will triumph, and the Iranian people and the resistance that you all have led will lead us to the outcome about which we have all been dreaming and believing and working for all these years.

Thank you, and may God bless each and every one of you. Onward towards victory.

Thank you.

Staff WriterJanuary 10, 2025
Arab-Islamic Committee in Defence of Ashraf
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