America’s killing of Qassem Soleimani is a major blow to Iran. Ayatollah Ali Khamenei’s regime will respond. But how?

The first point to note is that Iran will respond with a violent attack against the United States or its interests. Soleimani wasn’t simply the longtime leader of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps’ external action wing; he was that theocracy’s poster boy. Long idealized as courageous against Iran’s enemies, thoughtful in leadership, humble in life, and quietly devoted to Iran’s Khomeinist ideology, Soleimani was revered by the hardliners. Allowing Soleimani’s death to go unpunished would betray the regime’s ideology and broadcast weakness at the worse possible time.