The recent announcement that a “War Reconstruction Headquarters” has begun work as of today, made in a recent interview by Hamid Pourmohammadi, head of the Planning and Budget Organization, is a timely and important decision given the country’s sensitive circumstances. This should not be seen merely as an executive measure to repair damage or manage infrastructure projects; rather, in a more precise reading, it signals the country’s entry into a new stage of governance, a stage in which Iran must prepare itself for a “prolonged state of contestation.” In this situation, whether conventional military confrontation is halted or not, its economic, psychological, media, and infrastructural dimensions become even more complex and draining than the period of direct conflict.

Toward a Wartime Government

In such conditions, speaking of a “wartime government” or at least a “government in a state of war” is a strategic imperative. The experience of modern wars has shown that countries which assume the end of military conflict equals the end of confrontation often suffer even heavier blows in the post-war phase. When an adversary cannot break a nation’s will on the battlefield, it turns to the economy, livelihoods, infrastructure, social capital, and public resilience. For this reason, Iran’s future conflict is perhaps more likely to unfold not in the skies, seas, or borders, but in the realms of economy, production, media, public opinion, markets, and social morale.

From this perspective, the formation of a reconstruction headquarters is a positive and necessary step, especially as the head of the Planning and Budget Organization emphasized in his remarks that “the reconstruction process must be carried out with speed so it can evolve into a ‘comprehensive modernization’ to erase the آثار of the attacks.” However, the success of such a decision depends on a shift in governing paradigms. For reconstruction and modernization, the country can no longer operate through the same bureaucratic, centralized, slow, heavy, fragmented, and exhausted models of the past. A wartime government first and foremost requires a redefinition of macro-level executive management.

In such conditions, a manager is not merely an administrative official; they are a commander in the field of national resilience. Therefore, appointing capable, clean, nationally minded, motivated, tested managers with an unrelenting spirit and the ability to make swift, decisive decisions becomes a vital necessity. In the reconstruction era, managerial error is not a simple administrative mistake, it can lead to erosion of public trust and weakening of national security.

Alongside this, the most important pillar of a wartime government is the people. No major reconstruction project can succeed without genuine public participation. The government must facilitate real public engagement rather than confining all affairs within heavy formal state structures. Historical experience in major crises shows that wherever people feel they have a real role in the country’s destiny, vast social capacities are activated. The potential of the private sector, grassroots groups, local institutions, philanthropists, knowledge-based companies, and social networks must be mobilized for reconstruction. Reconstruction is not merely an infrastructure project; it is also the rebuilding of trust, hope, and a sense of national participation. Commitment to the people as the core of national power must be free from rhetoric and superficiality, and must avoid polarizing optics, instead enabling broad public participation.

Strengthening Economy as First Line of Defense

Perhaps the most important transformation needed lies in the economic sphere. The recent war demonstrated that one of the most vulnerable points of Iran’s economy is the heavy dependence of many production sectors on foreign currency. This is precisely where the adversary will focus its efforts, disrupting currency supply chains, increasing pressure on the foreign exchange market, and creating economic uncertainty to erode societal resilience. For this reason, decoupling a significant portion of national production from currency dependence is no longer an economic choice; it is a national security necessity.

In fact, the country requires a paradigm shift in economic governance. For years, a significant part of Iran’s economic competition has revolved around access to foreign currency, a model that has gradually pushed the economy toward speculation, rent-seeking, import dependency, and structural reliance. The time has come to change this logic and restructure economic competition around non-currency national capacities. This means leveraging advantages such as human capital, domestic technology, indigenous capabilities, energy resources, geography, maritime access, transit routes, internal production chains, and regional markets as the central drivers of economic strength.

A wartime government, if it is to succeed, must build a “resilient economy”, an economy capable of sustaining essential societal needs even under external pressure, currency disruptions, and international constraints, without halting national progress. In such conditions, reconstruction is not limited to building bridges, roads, and factories; it is about constructing a new model of economic governance. Drawing on successful global models of economic resilience can help shorten this transition.

In this context, the role of media is also decisive. In modern warfare, media is not merely a tool of information, it is part of the battlefield itself. Media must simultaneously perform several critical functions: strengthening social hope, clarifying national realities, preventing psychological erosion in society, promoting a culture of participation and conservation, and countering the enemy’s cognitive warfare. A society afflicted by despair, fatigue, and distrust may become vulnerable even without military defeat. Media institutions, particularly the national broadcaster as the country’s most far-reaching platform, must undertake fundamental reforms in both messaging and language. The current communicative framework may not be effective for such a paradigm shift and modernization. Generational change and its implications make deep structural reform in media essential. In other words, a wartime government requires a distinct media system with a distinct language and message.

The reality is that Iran has entered a period in which the concept of national security is no longer limited to military equipment and defensive power. Today, national security means the ability to maintain social cohesion, manage the economy under pressure, preserve public trust, and sustain governance effectiveness. If the government can use reconstruction as an opportunity to reform inefficient structures, empower competent forces, socialize the economy, and strengthen national resilience, today’s threats may turn into a platform for a historic leap forward. This is what the head of the Planning and Budget Organization referred to as “comprehensive modernization.” However, if reconstruction is confined merely to infrastructure projects and structural reforms are neglected, the country may face even more complex and exhausting challenges in a deeper phase of conflict.

The time for major decisions is now, decisions that must prepare Iran not only to recover from the damages of war, but to live and progress in a prolonged era of competition and sustained pressure.