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Washington should spend Iran’s frozen billions on satellite internet for its people
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Washington and Tehran have signed the Islamabad memorandum, and one term dominates the rest: the release of $24 billion in frozen Iranian reserves once a final deal is struck. President Trump has signaled that these assets will move only upon a finalized agreement. The debate has fixed on whether and when to hand the money over. It has skipped the prior question — whose money it is, and what would actually serve them.
An estimated $100 billion in Iranian assets immobilized abroad are not the private treasury of a ruling clique. These reserves represent the accumulated product of a nation’s oil, commerce and labor. International law recognizes the Islamic Republic as a sovereign representative. However, a regime that governs by domestic terror and exports regional instability is a usurper of the national patrimony, not its legitimate steward. Returning this capital as a reward for aggression represents a profound misallocation of assets. This choice ratifies the regime’s most audacious fiction: that the Iranian people and their jailers share identical interests.
Washington has recently rejected this fiction. When the Afghan Republic collapsed in 2021, the United States froze approximately $7 billion in central bank reserves. Rather than surrendering these assets to the Taliban or liquidating them for creditors, Washington established the Fund for the Afghan People. This Swiss-based trust insulated $3.5 billion for the population. It successfully denied the sanctioned regime a single dollar. When 9/11 creditors attempted to seize these reserves, federal courts intervened. The judiciary refused to treat central bank assets as Taliban property available to satisfy judgments.
A year prior, the U.S., the European Union, and the United Nations built a comparable mechanism for Venezuela. This architecture ring-fenced more than $3 billion from the Maduro regime’s grasp. The operational template is proven. The statutory authority — the International Emergency Economic Powers Act — is firmly established. The core principle remains settled: the frozen wealth of an illegitimate government can be legally preserved for the nation it misrules.
If these frozen assets belong to the Iranian population, policymakers must identify what serves them most. Digital connectivity is a must-have. The regime’s survival hinges on information isolation. The Islamic Republic relies on systematic network blackouts to govern. It completely severed domestic internet access for nearly three months during the last major domestic uprising. This tactic prevented external observation of state violence. Tehran has since criminalized Starlink access. The state threatens users with severe legal penalties. Authorities can impose capital punishment if they classify unauthorized connectivity as espionage.
A government capable of disconnecting a nation’s communication infrastructure can isolate local protests. It can suppress documentation and neutralize domestic movements before they gain momentum. Despite all the pressure, Starlink usage is growing, but cost and access remain the hurdles. The decisive fix removes hardware from the equation. Direct-to-cell service links ordinary phones to satellites, with no terminal to smuggle, distribute or conceal. The Pentagon explored direct-to-cell coverage for Iran, but the reported price, as much as $500 million to launch and $100 million a month to operate, stalled the effort. That funding gap is precisely what a dedicated trust would close.
Washington has previously treated internet access for Iranians as a primary instrument of policy. It is not a secondary consideration. The Office of Foreign Assets Control established specific communication authorizations. First issued as General License D-2, these rules are now codified. This regulatory framework expressly supports providing ordinary Iranians with tools to counter state censorship and surveillance. The provision even authorizes leasing satellite capacity directly into the country. The legal architecture required to expand Iranian connectivity is already operational. The current missing variables are political will and adequate capital allocation to achieve scale.
An operational program is required to scale this architecture. This initiative should be structured as the Iranian People’s Connectivity or Internet Freedom Fund. The asset base would consist of a dedicated trust drawn entirely from Iran’s frozen and confiscated assets. Governed like its Afghan and Venezuelan predecessors, the fund would utilize independent trustees and strict unanimous-consent safeguards. These mechanisms guarantee that the regime cannot access a single dollar. Financially insulated, the fund would underwrite lawful procurement under existing U.S. regulatory authorizations. It would support direct-to-cell capacity and secure hardware distribution through trusted networks, with U.S. government support.
The administration faces a genuine choice of strategy. Returning the reserves to the regime would finance oppression in Iran, aggression in the region, and terrorism abroad. This antagonizes Washington’s real partners in Iran: the tens of millions of Iranians who oppose the regime. These individuals remain the rightful owners of the national patrimony. Only this path advances American interests. It honors those rightful owners. It strikes the regime at its ultimate choke point of state control.
A free Iran will not be purchased at a negotiating table. However, a transition can be hastened by a decision Washington is uniquely positioned to execute. Policymakers must allocate the Iranian people’s assets to the one thing their rulers fear most. They fear an Iran that cannot be silenced. A free Iran begins with a connected one.
Aidin Panahi, Ph.D., is an energy expert, and a member of the Iran Prosperity Project. Saeed Ghasseminejad, Ph.D., is a senior fellow at the National Union for Democracy in Iran and director of the Iran Prosperity Project.
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Islamic Republic
Tehran
Washington
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