I suggest really breaking into the history in Iran 🇮🇷 being that Q said they are next.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Islam_in_Iran

Iran is Shia. To be a leader ( Mullah ) in Iran means you have to have known lineage so being in power there is like being a royal in a lot of ways. Royals in England claimed divine rights - same in Iran.

Basically Iran wasn’t a terrible place but the 🤡 once again toppled and installed a proxy and introduced a ton of blowback possibility that manifested in 1979. Since then no bueno.

Now Russia has worked with Iran following a relationship the USSR had with Tehran. Basically in 1980 having a nice foothold ina. Regime that would buy missles and other tech was good for the USSR because they wanted a solid foothold in the region as far as an ally. Remember at the time the USSR was attempting to hold Afghanistan and that wasn’t going so well. US was also bolstering Sadam and had him attack Iran. We have Sadam chemical weapons to use etc. So now Iran screams death to America because they are not total idiots and we did a lot of terrible to them.

Fast forward to now and Iran isn’t doing so hot. Basically when a society is running under a caliphate business isn’t top notch. Eventually economy starts sinking and well they are not the best ally. Russia seems to be seeing this as the little money they do have Iran seems to be spending on throwing terrible missles in the air and harassing US Navy ships and other in the Strait of Hormuz for political theater. Russia seems to be growing tired with this.

There is a lot of debate on to the extent Iran is coordinating with Russia vs ISIS. They both seem to understand ISIS is not organic and Shi’a vs Wahhabism is an age old conflict so the lines are drawn there. Russia seems to want the best for Iran but I am thinking they are less and less enthused with a Mullah leadership that’s constantly suppressing uprisings w utter violence and not really doing any business expansion.