Iran Thought They WON… Then the Mountains EXPLODED

The Military Show

Iran believed it had survived Operation Epic Fury, but a new threat may be emerging from within. Reports of coordinated attacks across Iran’s Kurdish regions have raised questions about whether a broader insurgency is taking shape against the regime. In this video, we examine the reported clashes, the history behind Kurdish resistance, and what these developments could mean for Iran’s future. Could internal unrest become Tehran’s greatest challenge? Watch to see the full analysis.  ⏱️ CHAPTERS: 00:00 - Kurdish Army Attacks Iranian IRGC Security Forces 02:20 - IRGC Navy Rear Admiral Dies Amid Kurdish Conflict 04:03 - Five Kurdish Armies Unite Against Iran Regime 07:36 - Kurdish Resistance Fighters Deploy Advanced US Weapons 11:22 - Operation Epic Fury Destroys 13,000 Iran Targets 15:33 - Will the US CIA Support Iran Kurdish Rebels?  Support us directly as we bring you independent, up-to-date reporting on military news and global conflicts by clicking here: https://www.youtube.com/@TheMilitaryShow/join  #militarystrategy #militarydevelopments #militaryanalysis #themilitaryshow  SOURCES: https://pastebin.com/x98UjyU3  The appearance of U.S. Department of Defense visual information on the WarLeaks - The Military Show does not imply or constitute Department of Defense endorsement.

Transcript

00:00Iran thought it had won. The nation had absorbed the thousands of strikes that came with Operation

00:05Epic Fury, and its blockade of the Strait of Hormuz had created so much oil price pressure

00:11that the US was forced to negotiate. An evil regime still stood, and soon things would be

00:17back to normal for the morphed mullahs of Iran. Then the mountains exploded, and everything

00:22changed. But it's not the US that Iran's regime will have to worry about. Something else is

00:27coming. Five Kurdish armies are on their way to wipe the regime out, and the danger from within

00:33now looks more lethal than the fire from above. It all started with reports of deaths within the

00:39Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps, or IRGC. On June 30th, news broke that the previous few days had

00:45seen several armed skirmishes in Iran that had led to the deaths of four Iranian security personnel,

00:52along with injuries to several others. Among the dead were two members of the IRGC,

00:58the Jerusalem Post reported, in what Iranian authorities are already calling armed terrorist

01:04attacks. But it's where these attacks took place that deserves notice. The two IRGC members died in

01:10Pava, which is a border city in Iran's Qumanshah province. The other two casualties, who were both

01:16police officers, died of wounds sustained in shootings in Bana, which is in Iran's Kurdistan

01:22province. Clashes have also happened in Mahabad and Marivan, the outlet reports. These locations

01:28matter. All of these incidents took place in the mountainous terrain of western Iran, where the Kurds

01:34live. And they were spread out far and wide. Mahabad and Marivan are about 230 kilometers apart,

01:40with Bana between them. Pava is 100 kilometers south of Marivan. But all are in or around Kurdish

01:47territory. And that's the connective tissue that runs through all of this. Something is brewing in

01:52Iran right now. As more time has passed since this initial flurry of attacks, more information has

01:58emerged about what's going on in the mountains of western Iran. Rumors are emerging that these four

02:04attacks are far from isolated incidents. They're spread across over 200 kilometers of Zagros Mountains

02:10territory. And they're part of a larger movement of strikes that are all occurring across territory

02:16in which Kurdish fighters have operated for decades. That's a hint of what's to come for Iran's regime.

02:22The Kurds, whom that regime has brutalized for so long, seem to have finally gotten their act together

02:28and are now launching coordinated assaults against the IRGC and other Iranian authorities throughout

02:34their territory. And worse yet for Iran, the Kurds have already claimed a big scalp, allegedly.

02:41On June 30th, right around the time that the four attacks were happening, Iran Wire reported on a

02:46strange incident that had occurred on the highways of the Kerman province. On June 29th,

02:51Mohammed Akhbazadeh's vehicle reportedly flipped over. He suffered severe injuries at the scene and,

02:57despite being taken to hospital, Akhbazadeh died a few hours later. Why does all of this matter?

03:03Akhbazadeh was a rear admiral second class and was also the political deputy of the representative

03:08office of the supreme leader in the IRGC navy. In other words, he was the precise type of high

03:14profile figure that you would expect to be targeted by Kurdish militants if those militants are ramping up

03:19their efforts to kick the IRGC and Iran's regime out of the seat of power for good. Of course,

03:25Iran claims this was all an accident. Akhbazadeh rolled his car, no more than that, nothing to

03:31see here. But Iran's higher-ups have a strange tendency to die in car accidents, and the timing

03:37of all of this is just far too coincidental. Granted, Kerman is in Iran's southeast, far away from

03:43the attacks that have been occurring in and around Kurdish territory. But a major IRGC figure dying when

03:48the IRGC and Iran's security forces are battling Kurds fits far too well to be ignored. What Iran

03:54has on its hands now may not just be localized aggression from some Kurdish upstarts, it could

04:00be the start of a revolution. And if it is, there has never been a better time than now for

04:05the Kurds

04:05to rise up and take on Iran's regime. The IRGC claims this is all about terrorism, isolated acts

04:12of aggression that are going to be put down. If we ignore the hypocrisy in that statement from an

04:16organization that is as terrorist as they come, the IRGC has attempted to respond. As Iran International

04:22reported on June 30th, the IRGC claims that it killed six armed men during a clash close to Iran's

04:29northwestern border somewhere in the mountains between Mahabad and Piran Shah. Again, this is Kurdish

04:35territory and if the IRGC is to be believed, the six-person team was carrying weapons and military

04:40equipment with the goal of carrying out sabotage and terrorist operations. This shouldn't be seen

04:46as a success for the IRGC, it should be a sign. A new front is opening up in the war

04:51that has

04:52engulfed Iran and it's not the US that is opening it. Iran's Kurds are going on the attack and this

04:57initial spate of skirmishes is just the starting point for something much larger than the IRGC will be

05:03able to handle. According to Newsweek, the Norway-based Hengor Organization for Human Rights says the

05:08Pave strike was carried out by a Kurdish group called Khori Hiwa, which means Son of Hope.

05:14That group is newly formed, the organization says, and it's far from the only army that the IRGC is

05:19facing. Four fighters killed in the Mahabad incident were part of the Kurdistan Free Life Party or PJAK

05:25rebel group. PJAK itself says, this public declaration is revealing in its own right.

05:31PJAK is outright saying that its fighters are battling against the IRGC, but the fact the IRGC

05:38is having to deal with several different groups at once is even more worrying for the regime.

05:43That suggests collaboration, coordination, cohesion. And if all of these things are coming together now,

05:49it tells us that a front is opening up along Kurdish territory in Iran. A new front is rising and

05:56there

05:56are five separate armies now united at its core. But we'll be getting back to that. Right now what

06:02we're seeing here is Iran being delivered a terrible dose of its own medicine. For years the regime has

06:07oppressed the Kurdish people in the mountains. Resistance has always existed. Now that resistance

06:13is beginning to blossom into something that Iran's regime knows it won't be able to handle.

06:17The writing is on the wall and even the new supreme leader Moitaba Khamenei knows that he needs to get

06:23the regime's house in order so that it's ready to do something about the Kurdish threat. Khamenei's

06:28approach to the ongoing peace talks with the US tells us all we need to know about where his head

06:32is

06:32right now. Back on June 18th, Al Jazeera reported that Khamenei had signed the Memorandum of Understanding

06:38proposed through peace talks with the US, despite having initially disagreed with the contents. At the time,

06:44Khamenei said he signed despite his difference in opinion with Iran's President Masoud Pazeshkian

06:49because he wanted to safeguard the rights of the Iranian nation and the resistance front.

06:54Now we see a much different story emerge. A story in which Khamenei and his IRGC need to focus

07:00all of their resources on a war to come rather than the one that they are fighting with the US.

07:05America

07:06isn't Iran's big problem anymore. The Kurds have taken that role and in a moment we're going to tell you

07:11why all of this matters and explore what these initial sparks of the Kurdish rebellion could

07:15mean for Iran in the long term. There may even be a surprising role that the US could still yet

07:21play.

07:21But before we dig into that, this is the military show. We bring you the full picture,

07:26not just the headlines. If you haven't already, hit subscribe and ring the bell to make sure that

07:31you see what we have coming up. So the Kurdish threat, is it really as much of a problem for

07:37Iran's

07:37regime as this spate of attacks suggests that it is? To answer that question, we first need to dig

07:43a little deeper into the history between Iran's regime and the Kurds that have made the Zagros

07:47mountains their home. That history isn't pleasant. Despite Kurds making up 10-12% of the Iranian

07:54population, they have been persecuted by Iran's regime from practically the moment that former

07:59Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei came into power. They have always been treated like a threat. For around

08:05four centuries, the Kurds have lived right where they are now in the Zagros mountains.

08:09And though they've always had some sort of trouble with Iran's various governments over the years,

08:13the jihad that the elder Khamenei declared back in 1979 was the surest sign that Iran's regime

08:19wanted to get rid of them for good. Throughout the 1980s and even up to the present day,

08:24Iran's regime has mostly been able to keep the Kurdish resistance under control. Of course,

08:29there have been isolated attacks, but for so long, the Kurds have been scattered,

08:33and their resistance underfunded and fractured, which has made it easier for Iran's regime to

08:38maintain control. But it's not just control that the regime and the IRGC want. As Genocide Watch

08:44pointed out in a November 2025 piece, the Kurds in Iran have been subjected to multiple attempts by

08:50Iran to limit their autonomy and force them into assimilating into the Iranian culture that the

08:55regime has created. Whenever the Kurds have spoken out about any of this, the result has always

09:00been brutal crackdowns. Kurdish political groups have been outlawed by Iran's regime,

09:06which prevents Kurdish voices from being heard in Iran's political structure.

09:10Civilian leaders are often arrested, stripping away the social tools that would allow the Kurds

09:15in Iran to organize any sort of peaceful dissent. Kurdish symbols are banned in Iran,

09:20so is the Kurdish language. Physically, it engages in arbitrary arrests, torture, surveillance,

09:25and hands out death penalties on an unimaginable scale, Genocide Watch says of the Iranian regime

09:31and its approach to the Kurdish population. That's the backdrop for what we're seeing in Iran right

09:36now. It's also the reason why many have suggested that it would ultimately be a Kurdish uprising that

09:42spells the true end of Iran's regime once Operation Epic Fury started. In early March,

09:48both the Atlantic Council and the Council on Foreign Relations or CFR speculated on whether the

09:53beginning of Operation Epic Fury could lead to Iran's Kurds mounting a true challenge against Iran's

09:59regime. The CFR suggested that the end of the US operation would signal an attempt by Iran's regime

10:04to crack down on groups within Iran that could be a threat. The Kurds are perhaps the most prominent

10:10group that fits under that umbrella, and that is motivation, if any more were needed, to start the

10:14uprising. The Kurds may still continue to resist the central government, and significant fighting may

10:20ensue. It's not uncommon for Kurds from other countries to come to volunteer their support to

10:25their Iranian brethren. Much would depend on Washington's willingness to continue standing

10:29by them and to persuade the Iranian regime not to seek revenge, the CFR said. We'll come back to

10:34Washington's potential role soon. The Atlantic Council took a more practical approach to its assessment,

10:40pointing out that the various Kurdish armed resistance groups in Iran are far from helpless,

10:44even if they were once fractured. These organizations have armed wings that are equipped with rifles,

10:50RPGs and mortars that can be deployed against Iran's regime. Kurdish security forces also maintain

10:56several special operations units. One of those units, the counter-terrorism group, has been trained by

11:02the US and has more advanced equipment, including M4 carbines, night vision technology and sniper rifles.

11:09So the ability is there, and though a minority group, the fact that the Kurdish people make up around

11:1410% of a country with a population of over 90 million people, suggests that there is enough

11:19manpower to create a formidable unified army. But that brings us to the two things that we need

11:24to see for the attacks that the Kurds have carried out in late June to evolve into a more coordinated

11:29war against Iran's regime. Opportunity and unity. The former has definitely arisen, all due to Operation

11:36Epic Fury. The absolute firestorm that the US and Israel unleashed on Iran, despite all of the

11:42geopolitical problems that resulted, has severely weakened Iran's regime and the IRGC.

11:47CBC reports that the US has managed to strike 13,000 out of an estimated 16,000 targets in Iran

11:54during its campaign. Those targets ranged from air defenses and warships to command and control

11:59centers that are vital to keeping the IRGC and Iran's army organized. More than 50 Iranian military bases

12:06have been damaged since Operation Epic Fury began, the outlet adds. And it's been suggested that Iran's

12:11military has been degraded to between 60 and 80% of its capacity. Iran International also reports that

12:18there is even talk about disbanding the IRGC due to the group gaining greater power in the Iranian regime.

12:24Whether this would be a true disbandant or simply a rebranding exercise isn't clear,

12:29but the fact that it's even being spoken about at all showcases the disarray within Iran's military

12:34structure. That chaos creates chances for the Kurds to launch a large-scale campaign that at the very

12:40least could force Iran's regime to leave them be or if executed well could even lead to the crumbling

12:46of a regime that is still teetering too close to the precipice. The stability that Iran's regime needs

12:52to function well enough to stop an organized Kurdish resistance was already crumbling as mass protests

12:57over the state of the country's economy triggered everything that we've seen so far in 2026.

13:03Now with so many regime and IRGC leaders dead, it's hard for Iran to organize the sorts of crackdowns

13:09that have kept the Kurds down for so long. However, opportunity must be married to unity.

13:14And that brings us back to something we mentioned earlier. We told you that there are five Kurdish

13:19armies all ready to fight against Iran. That wasn't hyperbole. Just a few days before the US launched

13:25Operation Epic Fury, an interesting development took place among the Kurds. Five Kurdish Iranian political

13:30parties decided to unite to form the coalition of political forces of Iranian Kurdistan. All five of

13:37those parties have military wings, The Atlantic reports, and they all seem to be willing to fall

13:42under the overall leadership of the Democratic Party of Iranian Kurdistan or KDPI. It's almost as though

13:49these parties knew that something was coming that would rock the Iranian regime to its core and they

13:54wanted to be ready to take advantage. The US is also believed to have communicated with several of

13:59these groups as early as March 5th. That's when Al Jazeera reported that US President Donald Trump had

14:04spoken to the leaders of the Kurdistan Democratic Party, the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan, and the

14:09KDPI that we mentioned a moment ago. The unified Kurdish parties, which we must remind you the Iranian

14:15regime has tried to make illegal, also issued a call for Iranian military members to defect to their

14:20cause. That's an interesting wrinkle. Unhappiness with Iran's regime extends far beyond the Kurdish

14:26population. If this united group of Kurds can bring others onto their side then the Iranian regime has a

14:32serious problem on its hands. In this we see the confluence of unity and opportunity. And remember that

14:38these Kurdish groups are not amateurs. They're armed. Many of the members of their military wings are

14:43well trained. What we're now seeing in the Zagros Mountains region of Iran could be the beginning of

14:48a dangerous strategy that will cause massive problems for Iran. Kurds know those mountains well,

14:54certainly better than the IRGC. It's possible that the unified Kurdish militants are launching attacks

14:59against Iran's regime outside of their territory to bait the IRGC into launching an assault in the Zagros

15:05mountains. If that's the case then Iran is going to struggle. It will be bringing tanks and missiles

15:11to a fight where both would end up being useless. The Kurds know all of the natural choke points in

15:16their mountains. They can leave, launch attacks, then withdraw back into the cover of the mountains,

15:21inflicting damage against an Iranian military that has already been devastated by Operation Epic Fury.

15:27Whittle away at that military and the weakened regime may follow. And that mention of Operation Epic

15:32Fury brings us back to the US. America may yet have a role to play in the toppling of Iran's

15:37regime.

15:38No boots on the ground will come from the US. The country has already laid the groundwork for an

15:42uprising with its bombardment of Iran. What it could do now is provide the support that the Kurds need

15:48to finish the job. There were even suggestions that America was doing just that as far back as March 4th.

15:54CNN reported that sources it had spoken to claimed that the CIA was actively working with Kurdish

16:00resistance groups to encourage a popular uprising in Iran. This sort of thing is in the CIA's wheelhouse

16:05and we know that the US has worked with the Kurds before. However, there are also signs that the US

16:11may not be willing to work with the Kurds. The Trump factor came into play several months after this

16:16report. In a June 16th piece, the conversation claimed that the US has abandoned the Kurds and Trump

16:22had plenty to say about the matter. The Kurds take, take, take. They have a great reputation in Congress.

16:27Congress says they fight hard. They fight hard when they get paid. I am very disappointed in the Kurds,

16:33Trump declared from the White House in May. It's always so difficult to get a beat on whether what

16:38Trump says is really what he means. But what we're seeing now in Iran could well indicate that the

16:42US is back on board with the Kurds. Peace talks with Iran have stalled once more, even after Khamenei

16:48signed a memorandum he didn't want to sign. Those peace talks being finalized would allow Iran's regime to

16:54focus on the Kurds. Maybe we're seeing some sort of political play here that nobody expected

16:59as the US lengthens the peace process to give the Kurds time. Now we're seeing the Kurdish forces

17:05carry out coordinated attacks against the IRGC and Iran's regime across hundreds of kilometers

17:10of territory. Coincidence? Maybe. Or this could be the start of something much bigger with the US

17:17working in the shadows to support a united group of people whose goal is to get rid of an oppressive

17:22regime that is weaker now than it's ever been. Iran isn't the only nation that is dealing with

17:27issues on its own territory. Thousands of kilometers away, Putin and his Russian cronies,

17:31who are allies of Iran, are dealing with issues of their own. Chechnya is barreling toward a succession

17:37crisis and that could result in Putin having to deal with an internal uprising of his own.

17:41You can find out what all of this means if you watch our video. And if you enjoyed this video,

17:46remember to subscribe to The Military Show and hit the notification bell to see more of our coverage and

17:51analysis of the latest geopolitical developments from all around the world. And thank you, as always, for watching.

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