Dr. Adam McConnel is an American scholar.
"It means nothing to you to sacrifice life, whether yours or someone else's. You're just the sort of person needed. You're just the sort I need. I know of no one else but you. You're the leader, the sun, and I'm your worm…" [1]
The English term "quisling" comes from Vidkun Quisling, a Norwegian politician whom Adolph Hitler made Norway's Minister President after Germany invaded that country during WWII. Quisling was executed for his collusion at the end of the war. Another infamous WWII-era example was Marshal Petain, who served as Vichy France's leader, also in cooperation with Nazi Germany. Petain spent his last years in prison.
Even though the US, since WWII, frequently tinkered with the domestic politics of global societies, Washington generally tried to establish as much legitimacy and international support as possible while doing so. Wars such as Korea or Vietnam had to be justified to the global community. Military interventions, such as Lebanon in the 1980s, Yugoslavia in the 1990s, or Iraq and Afghanistan 25 years ago were done under the auspices of an international coalition.
During those decades, the US found many willing collaborators, who were frequently discarded when Washington decided they were either a liability or expendable. Ngo Dinh Diem, for instance, was South Vietnam's President from 1955-1963, overseeing a violent regime that buttressed the US effort against North Vietnam. After the CIA decided Diem had become a burden, it looked the other way when a coup resulted in Diem's execution.
Manuel Noriega collaborated with the US for decades until he became Panama's de facto leader in 1983. In what now seems like a trial run for Maduro's capture, the US invaded Panama in order to arrest Noriega in December 1989. Noriega spent the rest of his life in prison.
Continuing on with today, US/Israeli war on Iran contains many nauseating elements, but this historian's attention is drawn to Reza Pahlavi's attempts to present himself as a viable governing alternative. Pahlavi's father, Mohammad Reza, was Shah of Iran from 1941-1979, so Pahlavi was quick to see an opportunity to reassert his claim to Iran's leadership [2].
Reza Pahlavi is only the most recent illustration [3] of this tragic and repetitive thread in human history. When power scans the political landscape for viable collaborators, figures such as Pahlavi inevitably emerge, proffer themselves, and are discarded when no longer useful. Such quislings rarely enjoy the legitimacy in the society they hope to dominate that would justify the authority they will be granted. Instead, they hope to create that legitimacy afterwards, once the hegemon imposes them on that society.
Venezuelan politician Maria Machado volunteered her services only weeks before Pahlavi. Groveling on TV for Trump's attention, even dedicating her Nobel Peace Prize to him, Machado was abruptly shoved aside once Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro was spirited out of Caracas [4].
Preordained fates for collaborators
Such figures always suffer a similar -- and sometimes much worse -- fate, and the pages of history are littered with examples. After the CIA's 1953 coup against Iran's democratically elected Prime Minister, Mohammad Mosaddegh, Mohammad Reza consolidated his power with US support. Ultimately, his corrupt rule impoverished Iran so severely that it triggered the revolution which brought Ayatollah Khomeini to power. The Shah fled to the US and later died in Egypt after the Jimmy Carter Administration made it clear that the Shah was not welcome.
Juan Guaido was the first Trump Administration's "man in Venezuela," but he now lives in exile in the US. Mikhail Saakashvili's rise and fall as the West's "man in Georgia" played out during this century's first decade, but he's now under state custody in Tblisi, apparently suffering severe health problems.
Nothing new under the sun
In light of such history, identifying anything fundamentally innovative in Trump's actions toward foreign states seems difficult. The primary difference is that Trump does overtly, flagrantly, and with profane braggadocio what the US previously did quietly, surreptitiously, or through "coalitions of the willing." Even the title given to the air campaign against Tehran, much derided in the US press, is only slightly different from the title given to the 1983 US invasion of Grenada, called "Urgent Fury."
Instead, Trump is America's Id overcoming its Superego's resistance. Trump exercises raw international force, and flaunts his ability to do so, to the point where he tells the press that he wants to choose Iran's new leader [7].
So those who offer themselves as toady to the empire should be forewarned: this is how imperial power operates. For a period of time, they may enjoy the empire's largesse, but the end is guaranteed to be unpleasant.
[1] Fyodor Dostoevsky, Devils, Part 2, Chapter 8. Michael Katz, transl. Pyotr Verhovensky is speaking to Stavrogin; both represent different dimensions of Dostoevsky’s archetype for the modern, violent, amoral revolutionary.
[2] Pahlavi has styled himself Reza Shah II since his father’s death and been involved in various plots against the Iranian regime during the past 40 years.
[3] https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2026/3/3/worst-case-scenario-trump-weighs-replacing-khamenei-as-leader-of-iran
[4] https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c77krp7m362o
[5] https://www.theatlantic.com/national-security/2026/01/trump-venezuela-maduro-delcy-rodriguez/685497/
[6] https://www.reuters.com/world/americas/us-turns-up-heat-venezuela-with-threat-indict-new-leader-delcy-rodriguez-2026-03-03/
[7] https://www.aa.com.tr/en/americas/trump-demands-say-in-picking-irans-next-supreme-leader-calls-khameneis-son-unacceptable-report/3851782
*Opinions expressed in this article are the author's own and do not necessarily reflect the editorial policy of Anadolu.
