The timing is the dumbest. Either you attacked during the protest+insurection to try to divide Iran, or you waited for Komenei to die of his cancer and the election of another priest as the supreme leader. The guardians of the revolution part of the army would have been loyal to komenei's clan, so the choice would have been to let go the power or to start internal struggles.

Now they got to switch from a theocracy to an effective monarchy, for free.