America's Prince of Persia

On the 05^th of June 1967, the CIA created an intelligence memorandum titled “The Shah of Iran and his Policies”, this intelligence document was prepared before the Shah’s official visit on the 16^th of June 1967. In its summary the CIA described the Shah as “A proud and sensitive man” and said that “the Shah will be expecting recognition for his role as a leader of a country which is stable, achieving rapid economic growth, and undertaking widespread social and economic reforms.”  The document also referred to Shah as a good friend of the US and one of the few third-world leaders who publicly support the US Policy in Vietnam. 

The Shah who the CIA was referring to in this document was “Mohammad Reza Pahlavi” the last shah of Iran. He was the son of Reza Khan, a commander in the British Army who overthrew the Qajar dynasty and went on to become the Shah (King) of Iran on 12 December 1925, pursuant to the Constitution of Iran. Reza Shah's coronation took place much later, on 25 April 1926. It was at that time that his son, Mohammad Reza Pahlavi, was proclaimed the Crown Prince of Persia – to rule after his father. Reza Shah modernized Iran and brought reforms to the country however in August 1941, the Allied powers Great Britain and the Soviet Union invaded and occupied Iran by a massive air, land, and naval assault. By 28–29 August, the Iranian military situation was in complete chaos. The Anglo-Soviet invasion was instigated in response to Reza Shah's declaration of Neutrality in World War II and refusal to allow Iranian territory to be used to train, supply, and act as a transport corridor to ship arms to Russia for its war effort against Germany.

Reza Shah was forced by the invading British to abdicate in favor of his son Mohammad Reza Pahlavi who replaced his father as Shah on the throne on 16 September 1941. The British offered to keep his family in power if Reza Shah agreed to a life of exile and Reza Shah obliged. Under the rule of Mohammad Reza Pahlavi, political tensions in Iran had been brewing and this demanded the attention of the American and British leaders, in 1951 Mohammad Mosaddegh was appointed prime minister. The British economy was largely supported by the revenues that it got from the Anglo-Iranian Oil Company (AIOC), Mohammad Mosaddegh was committed to nationalize the petroleum industry which was controlled the by AIOC and he persuaded the parliament to nationalize the industry, shutting down the AIOC. 

The British government invited CIA officer Kermit Roosevelt Jr., grandson of former US President Theodore Roosevelt to London to propose collaboration on a secret plan to force Mosaddegh from office. Working with Shah, the CIA and British intelligence began to engineer a plot to overthrow Mossadeq. The Iranian premier, however, got wind of the plan and called his supporters to take to the streets in protest. At this point, the Shah left the country for “medical reasons.” While British intelligence backed away from the debacle, the CIA continued its covert operations in Iran.

Working with pro-Shah forces and, most importantly, the Iranian military, the CIA cajoled, threatened, and bribed its way into influence and helped to organize another coup attempt against Mossadeq. On August 19, 1953, the military, backed by street protests organized and financed by the CIA, overthrew Mossadeq. The Shah quickly returned to take power with General Fazlollah Zahedi as the new prime minister and, as thank you gesture to the American help, the Shah signed over 40 percent of Iran’s oil fields to U.S. companies. 

The tenure of Mohammed Reza Pahlavi was the most progressive for Iran and in January 1963, the Shah announced the "White Revolution", a six-point programme of reform calling for land reform, nationalization of the forests, the sale of state-owned enterprises to private interests, electoral changes to enfranchise women and allow non-Muslims to hold office, profit-sharing in industry, and a literacy campaign in the nation's schools. A Shi’a cleric, Ruhollah Khomeini, known in the Western world as Ayatollah Khomeini viewed the white revolution as "an attack on Islam" and called for a boycott of the referendum on the White Revolution. In June, 1963, just 2 days after this public denunciation of the Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi, Khomeini was detained in Qom and transferred to Tehran. Khomeini was kept under house arrest and released in August. On 26 October 1964, Khomeini denounced both the Shah and the United States.

Khomeini was finally arrested in November 1964 and held for half a year and upon his release, he was brought before Prime Minister Hasan Ali Mansur, who tried to convince Khomeini that he should apologize and drop his opposition to the government. When Khomeini refused, Mansur slapped Khomeini's face in a fit of rage. Two months later, Mansur was assassinated on his way to parliament. Four members of the Fadayan-e Islam were later executed for the murder. The Shah was more worried about the ambitions of Gamal Abdel Nasser Hussein, the president of Egypt who the Shah felt could be an immediate threat to Iran and overlooking the internal threat that was about to change the history of Iran.

The Shah became one of America’s most trusted Cold War allies, and U.S. economic and military aid poured into Iran during the 1950s, 1960s, and 1970s. In the 1970s, Iran had an economic growth rate equal to that of South Korea, Turkey and Taiwan, with Iran's great oil wealth, the Shah became the preeminent leader of the Middle East. By the 1970s, Mohammad Reza was considered one of the world's most successful and able leaders. Mohammad Reza was diagnosed with terminal cancer in 1974 and by June 1978 the Shah had stopped appearing in public. The Shah was out of the public picture and was losing his grip over country’s political system. In October 1977 a few hundred stated an anti-shah demonstration, after the death of Khomeini's son Mostafa. These demonstrators were considered as some extreme nationalist who were considered to be unorganized and were not considered to be an imminent threat. By October 1978, strikes were paralyzing the country, and in early December more than 10% of the country marched against the Shah throughout Iran.

The Shah felt that he was abandoned by the western countries and also blamed them for the revolution. The Shah knew that he had lost the grip on Iran and it was best for him to leave Iran and end the monarchy. On 17 January 1979, the Shah left the country and two weeks later, on Thursday, 1 February 1979, Khomeini returned in triumph to Iran. The west lost its friend in the region and they knew this would impact their economy and their dominance in the region as the revolutionaries were now in charge and Khomeini was their leader.

Khomeini and his supporters worked to suppress some former allies and rewrote the proposed constitution and in November 1979, the new constitution of the Islamic Republic was adopted by national referendum. Khomeini was instituted as the Supreme Leader (Guardian Jurist), and officially became known as the "Leader of the Revolution." A country whose political system was dominated by the west was soon to become one of their biggest mistakes and the Ayatollah was about the change the regional politics and make his impact on the United States becoming a nightmare for the Carter Administration.