Lakhasly

After the 1953 Iranian coup d'état, Pahlavi
aligned Iran with the Western Bloc and
cultivated a close relationship with the
United States to consolidate his power as
an authoritarian ruler. Relying heavily on
American support amidst the Cold War, he
remained the Shah of Iran for 26 years
after the coup, effectively keeping the
country from swaying towards the
influence of the Eastern Bloc and the
Soviet Union.
[6][7] Beginning in 1963,
Pahlavi implemented a number of reforms
aimed at modernizing Iranian society, in
d. Head of Revolutionary Council.
what is known as the White Revolution. In
light of his continued vocal opposition to
the modernization campaign after being
arrested twice, Khomeini was exiled from
Iran in 1964. However, as major ideological
tensions persisted between Pahlavi and
Khomeini, anti-government
demonstrations began in October 1977,
eventually developing into a campaign of
civil resistance that included elements of
secularism and Islamism.
[8][9][10] In August
1978, the deaths of between 377 and 470
people in the Cinema Rex fire — claimed by
the opposition as having been
orchestrated by Pahlavi's SAVAK — came
to serve as a catalyst for a popular
revolutionary movement across all of
Iran,[11][12] and large-scale strikes and
demonstrations paralyzed the entire
country for the remainder of that year.
On 16 January 1979, Pahlavi left the
country and went into exile as the last
Iranian monarch,[13] leaving behind his
duties to Iran's Regency Council and
Shapour Bakhtiar, the opposition-based
Iranian prime minister. On 1 February
1979, Khomeini returned to Iran, following
an invitation by the government;[6][14]
several thousand Iranians gathered to
greet him as he landed in the capital city of
Tehran.
[15] By 11 February 1979, the
monarchy was officially brought down and
Khomeini assumed leadership over Iran
while guerrillas and rebel troops
overwhelmed Pahlavi loyalists in armed
combat.[16][17] Following the March 1979
Islamic Republic referendum, in which 98%
of Iranian voters approved the country's
shift to an Islamic republic, the new
government began efforts to draft the
present-day Constitution of the Islamic
Republic of Iran;
[18][8][9][19][20] Khomeini
emerged as the Supreme Leader of Iran in
December 1979.[21]
The success of the Iranian Revolution was
met with surprise around the world,[22] and
was considered by many to be unusual in
nature: it lacked many of the customary
causes of revolutionary sentiment (e.g.,
defeat in war, a financial crisis, peasant
rebellion, or disgruntled military);[23]
occurred in a country that was
experiencing relative prosperity;[6][20]
produced profound change at great
speed;[24] was massively popular; resulted
in the massive exile that characterizes a
large portion of today's Iranian
diaspora;
[25] and replaced a pro-Western
secular[26] and authoritarian monarchy[6]
with an anti-Western Islamist
theocracy[6][19][20][27] that was based on the
concept of Velâyat-e Faqih (or
Guardianship of the Islamic Jurist),
straddling between authoritarianism and
totalitarianism.
[28] In addition to these, the
Iranian Revolution sought the spread of
Shia Islam across the Middle East through
the ideological tenets of Khomeinism —
particularly as a means of uprooting the
region's status quo, which favoured Sunni
Islam.
[29] After the consolidation of
Khomeinist factions, Iran began to back
Shia militancy across the region in an
attempt to combat Sunni influence and
establish Iranian dominance within the
Arab world, ultimately aiming to achieve an
Iranian-led Shia political order.
[30]
6. Other shortcomings of the previous
regime.
The Shah's regime was seen as an
oppressive, brutal,[35][36] corrupt, and lavish
regime by some of the society's classes at
that time.[35][37] It also suffered from some
basic functional failures that brought
economic bottlenecks, shortages, and
inflation.
[38] The Shah was perceived by
many as beholden to—if not a puppet of—a
non-Muslim Western power (i.e., the
United States)
[39][40] whose culture was
affecting that of Iran. At the same time,
support for the Shah may have waned
among Western politicians and media—
especially under the administration of U.S.
President Jimmy Carter—as a result of the
Shah's support for OPEC petroleum price
increases earlier in the decade.[41] When
President Carter enacted a human-rights
policy which said that countries guilty of
human-rights violations would be deprived
of American arms or aid, this helped give
some Iranians the courage to post open
letters and petitions in the hope that the
repression by the government might
subside.[42]
The Revolution that substituted the
monarchy of Mohammad Reza Shah
Pahlavi with Islam and Khomeini is
credited in part to the spread of the Shi'a
version of the Islamic revival. It resisted
westernization and saw Ayatollah
Khomeini as following in the footsteps of
the Shi'a Imam Husayn ibn Ali, with the
Shah playing the role of Husayn's foe, the
hated tyrant Yazid I.
[43] Other factors
include the underestimation of Khomeini's
Islamist movement by both the Shah's
reign—who considered them a minor
threat compared to the Marxists and
Islamic socialists[44][45][46]—and by the
secularist opponents of the government—
who thought the Khomeinists could be
sidelined.[47]
Tobacco Protest (1891)
At the end of the 19th century, the Shi'a
clergy (ulama) had a significant influence
on Iranian society. The clergy first showed
itself to be a powerful political force in
opposition to the monarchy with the 1891
Tobacco Protest. On 20 March 1890, the
long-standing Iranian monarch Nasir al-Din
Shah granted a concession to British
Major G. F. Talbot for a full monopoly over
the production, sale, and export of tobacco
for 50 years.[48] At the time, the Persian
tobacco industry employed over 200,000
people, so the concession represented a
major blow to Persian farmers and
bazaaris whose livelihoods were largely
dependent on the lucrative tobacco
business.[49] The boycotts and protests
against it were widespread and extensive
as result of Mirza Hasan Shirazi's fatwa
(judicial decree).[50] Within 2 years, Nasir
al-Din Shah found himself powerless to
stop the popular movement and cancelled
the concession.[51]
The Tobacco Protest was the first
significant Iranian resistance against the
Shah and foreign interests, revealing the
power of the people and the ulama
influence among them.[48]
Persian Constitutional Revolution
(1905–1911)
The growing dissatisfaction continued
until the Constitutional Revolution of
1905–1911. The revolution led to the
establishment of a parliament, the
National Consultative Assembly (also
known as the Majlis), and approval of the
first constitution. Although the
constitutional revolution was successful in
weakening the autocracy of the Qajar
regime, it failed to provide a powerful
alternative government. Therefore, in the
decades following the establishment of
the new parliament, a number of critical
events took place. Many of these events
can be viewed as a continuation of the
struggle between the constitutionalists
and the Shahs of Persia, many of whom
were backed by foreign powers against the
parliament.
Reza Shah (1921–1935)
Insecurity and chaos created after the
Constitutional Revolution led to the rise of
General Reza Khan, the commander of the
elite Persian Cossack Brigade who seized
power in a coup d'état in February 1921.
He established a constitutional monarchy,
deposing the last Qajar Shah, Ahmed
Shah, in 1925 and being designated
monarch by the National Assembly, to be
known thenceforth as Reza Shah, founder
of the Pahlavi dynasty.
There were widespread social, economic,
and political reforms introduced during his
reign, a number of which led to public
discontent that would provide the
circumstances for the Iranian Revolution.
Particularly controversial was the
replacement of Islamic laws with Western
ones and the forbidding of traditional
Islamic clothing, separation of the sexes,
and veiling of women's faces with the
niqab.
[52] Police forcibly removed and tore
chadors off women who resisted his ban
on the public hijab.
In 1935, dozens were killed and hundreds
injured in the Goharshad Mosque
rebellion.
[53][54][55] On the other hand,
during the early rise of Reza Shah, AbdulKarim Ha'eri Yazdi founded the Qom
Seminary and created important changes
in seminaries. However, he would avoid
entering into political issues, as did other
religious leaders who followed him. Hence,
no widespread anti-government attempts
were organized by clergy during the rule of
Reza Shah. However, the future Ayatollah
Khomeini was a student of Sheikh Abdul
Karim Ha'eri.[56]
Mosaddegh and The Anglo-Iranian Oil
Company (1951–1952)
From 1901 on, the Anglo-Persian Oil
Company (renamed the Anglo-Iranian Oil
Company in 1931), a British oil company,
enjoyed a monopoly on sale and
production of Iranian oil. It was the most
profitable British business in the world.[57]
Most Iranians lived in poverty while the
wealth generated from Iranian oil played a
decisive role in maintaining Britain at the
top of the world. In 1951, Iranian Prime
Minister Mohammad Mosaddegh pledged
to throw the company out of Iran, reclaim
the petroleum reserves and free Iran from
foreign powers.
In 1952, Mosaddegh nationalized the
Anglo-Iranian Oil Company and became a
national hero. The British, however, were
outraged and accused him of stealing. The
British unsuccessfully sought punishment
from the World Court and the United
Nations, sent warships to the Persian Gulf,
and finally imposed a crushing embargo.
Mosaddegh was unmoved by Britain's
campaign against him. One European
newspaper, the Frankfurter Neue Presse,
reported that Mosaddegh "would rather be
fried in Persian oil than make the slightest
concession to the British." The British
considered an armed invasion, but UK
Prime Minister Winston Churchill decided
on a coup after being refused American
military support by U.S. President Harry S.
Truman, who sympathized with nationalist
movements like Mosaddegh's and had
nothing but contempt for old-style
imperialists like those who ran the AngloIranian Oil Company. Mosaddegh, however,
learned of Churchill's plans and ordered
the British embassy to be closed in
October 1952, forcing all British diplomats
and agents to leave the country.
Although the British were initially turned
down in their request for American
support by President Truman, the election
of Dwight D. Eisenhower as U.S. president
in November 1952 changed the American
stance toward the conflict. On 20 January
1953, U.S. Secretary of State John Foster
Dulles and his brother, C.I.A. Director Allen
Dulles, told their British counterparts that
they were ready to move against
Mosaddegh. In their eyes, any country not
decisively allied with the United States was
a potential enemy. Iran had immense oil
wealth, a long border with the Soviet
Union, and a nationalist prime minister.
The prospect of a fall into communism
and a "second China" (after Mao Zedong
won the Chinese Civil War) terrified the
Dulles brothers. Operation Ajax was born,
in which the only democratic government
Iran ever had was deposed.
[58]
Iranian coup d'état (1953)
In 1941, an invasion of allied British and
Soviet troops deposed Reza Shah, who
was considered friendly to Nazi Germany,
and installed his son, Mohammad Reza
Pahlavi as Shah. In 1953, following the
nationalization of the Iranian oil industry
by the democratically elected prime
minister Mohammad Mossadegh,
American and British forces instituted a
highly effective embargo of Iranian oil, and
covertly destabilized the legislature and
helped return control to their ally, Pahlavi.
The American "Operation Ajax",
orchestrated by the CIA, was aided by the
British MI6 in organizing a military coup
d'état to oust Mossadegh. The Shah fled to
Italy when the initial coup attempt on
August 15 failed, but returned after a
successful second attempt on August
19.[59]
Pahlavi maintained a close relationship
with the U.S. government, as both regimes
shared opposition to the expansion of the
Soviet Union, Iran's powerful northern
neighbor. Like his father, the Shah's
government was known for its autocracy,
its focus on modernization and
Westernization, and for its disregard for
religious and democratic measures in
Iran's constitution. Leftist and Islamist
groups attacked his government (often
from outside Iran as they were suppressed
within) for violating the Iranian
constitution, political corruption, and the
political oppression, torture, and killings,
by the SAVAK secret police.
White Revolution (1963–1978)
Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi
The White Revolution was a far-reaching
series of reforms in Iran launched in 1963
by Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi and
lasted until 1978. Mohammad Reza Shah's
reform program was built especially to
weaken those classes that supported the
traditional system. It consisted of several
elements including land reform; sales of
some state-owned factories to finance the
land reform; the enfranchisement of
women; nationalization of forests and
pastures; formation of a literacy corps; and
the institution of profit-sharing schemes
for workers in industry.
[60]
The Shah advertised the White Revolution
as a step towards westernization,
[61] and it
was a way for him to legitimize the Pahlavi
dynasty. Part of the reason for launching
the White Revolution was that the Shah
hoped to get rid of the influence of
landlords and to create a new base of
support among the peasants and working
class.[62][63] Thus, the White Revolution in
Iran was an attempt to introduce reform
from above and preserve traditional power
patterns. Through land reform, the
essence of the White Revolution, the Shah
hoped to ally himself with the peasantry in
the countryside, and hoped to sever their
ties with the aristocracy in the city.
What the Shah did not expect, however,
was that the White Revolution led to new
social tensions that helped create many of
the problems the Shah had been trying to
avoid. The Shah's reforms more than
quadrupled the combined size of the two
classes that had posed the most
challenges to his monarchy in the past—
the intelligentsia and the urban working
class. Their resentment towards the Shah
also grew as they were now stripped of
organizations that had represented them
in the past, such as political parties,
professional associations, trade unions,
and independent newspapers. The land
reform, instead of allying the peasants
with the government, produced large
numbers of independent farmers and
landless laborers who became loose
political cannons, with no feeling of loyalty
to the Shah. Many of the masses felt
resentment towards the increasingly
corrupt government; their loyalty to the
clergy, who were seen as more concerned
with the fate of the populace, remained
consistent or increased. As Ervand
Abrahamian pointed out: "The White
Revolution had been designed to preempt
a Red Revolution. Instead, it paved the way
for an Islamic Revolution."
[64] The White
Revolution's economic "trickle-down"
strategy also did not work as intended. In
theory, oil money funneled to the elite was
supposed to be used to create jobs and
factories, eventually distributing the
money, but instead the wealth tended to
get stuck at the top and concentrated in
the hands of the very few.
[65]
Western culture was a plague or an
intoxication to be eliminated;[70] Ali
Shariati's vision of Islam as the one true
liberator of the Third World from
oppressive colonialism, neo-colonialism,
and capitalism;
[71] and Morteza
Motahhari's popularized retellings of the
Shia faith all spread and gained listeners,
readers and supporters.[70]
Most importantly, Khomeini preached that
revolt, and especially martyrdom, against
injustice and tyranny was part of Shia
Islam,[72] and that Muslims should reject
the influence of both liberal capitalism and
communism, ideas that inspired the
revolutionary slogan "Neither East, nor
West – Islamic Republic!"
Away from public view, Khomeini
developed the ideology of velayat-e faqih
(guardianship of the jurist) as government,
that Muslims—in fact everyone—required
"guardianship," in the form of rule or
supervision by the leading Islamic jurist or
jurists.[73] Such rule was ultimately "more
necessary even than prayer and fasting" in
Islam,[Note 2] as it would protect Islam from
deviation from traditional sharia law and in
so doing eliminate poverty, injustice, and
the "plundering" of Muslim land by foreign
non-believers.[74]
This idea of rule by Islamic jurists was
spread through his book Islamic
Government, mosque sermons, and
smuggled cassette speeches by
Khomeini[75][76] among his opposition
network of students (talabeh), ex-students
(able clerics such as Morteza Motahhari,
Mohammad Beheshti, Mohammad-Javad
Bahonar, Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani, and
Mohammad Mofatteh), and traditional
businessmen (bazaari) inside Iran.[75]
cohesion and organization of Khomeini's
forces.[79]
Communist groups—primarily the Tudeh
Party of Iran and the Fedaian
guerrillas[Note 3]—had been weakened
considerably by government repression.
Despite this the guerrillas did help play an
important part in the final February 1979
overthrow[81] delivering "the regime its
coup de grace."
[82] The most powerful
guerrilla group—the People's Mujahedin—
was leftist Islamist and opposed the
influence of the clergy as reactionary.
Some important clergy did not follow
Khomeini's lead. Popular ayatollah
Mahmoud Taleghani supported the left,
while perhaps the most senior and
influential ayatollah in Iran—Mohammad
Kazem Shariatmadari—first remained
aloof from politics and then came out in
support of a democratic revolution.[83]
Khomeini worked to unite this opposition
behind him (except for the unwanted
'atheistic Marxists'),[8][84] focusing on the
socio-economic problems of the Shah's
government (corruption and unequal
income and development),[8][85] while
avoiding specifics among the public that
might divide the factions[86]—particularly
his plan for clerical rule, which he believed
most Iranians had become prejudiced
against as a result of propaganda
campaign by Western
imperialists.
[Note 4][87]
In the post-Shah era, some revolutionaries
who clashed with his theocracy and were
suppressed by his movement complained
of deception,[85] but in the meantime antiShah unity was maintained.[88]
1970–1977
Several events in the 1970s set the stage
for the 1979 revolution.
The 1971 2,500-year celebration of the
Persian Empire at Persepolis, organized by
the government, was attacked for its
extravagance. "As the foreigners reveled
on drink forbidden by Islam, Iranians were
not only excluded from the festivities,
some were starving."
[89] Five years later,
the Shah angered pious Iranian Muslims
by changing the first year of the Iranian
solar calendar from the Islamic hijri to the
ascension to the throne by Cyrus the
the Shah's family was the foremost
beneficiary of the income generated by oil,
and the line between state earnings and
family earnings blurred. By 1976, the Shah
had accumulated upward of $1 billion
from oil revenue; his family – including 63
princes and princesses had accumulated
between $5 and $20 billion; and the family
foundation controlled approximately
$3 billion.[92] By mid-1977 economic
austerity measures to fight inflation
disproportionately affected the thousands
of poor and unskilled male migrants
settling in the cities working in the
construction industry. Culturally and
religiously conservative,[93] many went on
to form the core of the revolution's
demonstrators and "martyrs".[94]
All Iranians were required to join and pay
dues to a new political party, the Ḥezb-e
Rastakhiz party—all other parties were
banned.[95] That party's attempt to fight
inflation with populist "anti-profiteering"
campaigns—fining and jailing merchants
for high prices – angered and politicized
merchants while fueling black markets.
[96]
In 1977 the Shah responded to the "polite
reminder" of the importance of political
rights by the new American president,
Jimmy Carter, by granting amnesty to
some prisoners and allowing the Red
Cross to visit prisons. Through 1977 liberal
opposition formed organizations and
issued open letters denouncing the
government.[97] Against this background a
first crucial manifestation of public
expression of social discontent and
political protest against the regime took
place in October 1977, when the GermanIranian Cultural Association in Tehran
hosted a series of literature reading
sessions, organized by the newly revived
Iranian Writers Association and the
German Goethe-Institute. In these "Ten
Nights" (Dah Shab) 57 of Iran's most
prominent poets and writers read their
The chain of events began with the death
of Mostafa Khomeini, chief aide and eldest
son of Ruhollah Khomeini. He
mysteriously died at midnight on 23
October 1977 in Najaf, Iraq. SAVAK and
the Iraqi government declared heart attack
as the cause of death, though many
believed his death was attributed to
SAVAK.[103] Khomeini remained silent after
the incident, while in Iran with the spread
of the news came a wave of protest and
mourning ceremonies in several
cities.[104][105] The mourning of Mostafa
was given a political cast by Khomeini's
political credentials, their enduring
opposition to the monarchy and their exile.
The developments initiated by seminaries
closing on 7 January 1978 were followed
by the bazaar and seminary closing, and
students rallied towards the homes of the
religious leaders on the next day.
[106] On 9
January 1978, seminary students and
other people demonstrated in the city,
which was cracked down by the Shah's
security forces who shot live ammunition
to disperse the crowd when the peaceful
demonstration turned violent.[107] Between
5–300 of the demonstrators were
reportedly killed in the protest.[106] 9
January 1978 (19 Dey) is regarded as a
bloody day in Qom.[108][109]
Consolidation of the opposition
(February–March)
According to Shia customs, memorial
services (chehelom) are held 40 days after
a person's death.[110] Encouraged by
Khomeini (who declared that the blood of
martyrs must water the "tree of Islam"),[102]
radicals pressured the mosques and
moderate clergy to commemorate the
deaths of the students, and used the
occasion to generate protests.[111] The
informal network of mosques and bazaars,
which for years had been used to carry out
religious events, increasingly became
where protests were larger, and Tehran,
where they were smaller—protesting every
40 days. This amounted to a small
minority of the more than 15 million adults
in Iran.[119]
Against the wishes of Khomeini,
Shariatmadari called for 17 June mourning
protests to be carried out as a one-day
stay.
[110] Although tensions remained in
the milieu, the Shah's policy appeared to
have worked, leading Amuzegar to declare
that "the crisis is over." A CIA analysis in
August concluded that Iran "is not in a
revolutionary or even a pre-revolutionary
situation."
[120] These and later events in
Renewed protests (August–
September)
Appointment of Jafar Sharif-Emami as
prime minister (11 August)
By August, the protests had "kick[ed]…into
high gear,
"
[122] and the number of
demonstrators mushroomed to hundreds
of thousands.[119] In an attempt to dampen
inflation, the Amuzegar administration cut
spending and reduced business. However,
the cutbacks led to a sharp rise in layoffs—
particularly among young, unskilled, male
workers living in the working-class
districts. By summer 1978, the working
The protesters demanded that Shah
Mohammad Reza Pahlavi step down from
power and that Grand Ayatollah Ruhollah
Khomeini be returned from exile. The
protests grew incredibly fast, reaching
between six million and nine million in
strength in the first week. About 5% of the
population had taken to the streets in the
Muharram protests. Both beginning and
ending in the month of Muharram, the
protests succeeded, and the Shah stepped
down from power later that month.[137]
After the success of what would become
known as a revolution, Ayatollah Khomeini
returned to Iran as its religious and
political leader for life. Khomeini had been
an opposition leader to Shah for many
years, rising to prominence after the death
of his mentor, renowned scholar Yazdi
Ha'iri, in the 1930s.[138] Even in his years in
exile, Khomeini remained relevant in Iran.
Supporting the protests from beyond Iran's
borders, he proclaimed that "freedom and
liberation from the bonds of imperialism"
was imminent.[138]
Tasu'a and Ashura marches (10–11
December)
As the days of Tasu'a and Ashura (10 and
11 December) approached, in order to
prevent a deadly showdown the Shah
began to draw back. In negotiations with
Ayatollah Shariatmadari, the Shah ordered
the release of 120 political prisoners and
Karim Sanjabi, and on 8 December revoked
the ban on street demonstrations. Permits
Tehran Ashura demonstration, 11 December
1978
were issued for the marchers, and troops
were removed from the procession's path.
In turn, Shariatmadari pledged that to
make sure that there would be no violence
during the demonstrations.[112]
On 10 and 11 December 1978, the days of
Tasu'a and Ashura, between 6 and 9
million anti-Shah demonstrators marched
throughout Iran. According to one
historian, "even discounting for
exaggeration, these figures may represent
the largest protest event in history."
[139]
The marches were led by Ayatollah
Taleghani and National Front leader Karim
Sanjabi, thus symbolizing the "unity" of the
secular and religious opposition. The
mullahs and bazaaris effectively policed
the gathering, and protesters who
attempted to initiate violence were
restrained.[110]
More than 10% of the country marched in
anti-Shah demonstrations on the two days,
possibly a higher percentage than any
previous revolution. It is rare for a
revolution to involve as much as 1 percent
of a country's population; the French,
Russian, and Romanian revolutions may
have passed the 1 percent mark.[25]
The Shah is Gone — headline of
Iranian newspaper Ettela'at, 16
January 1979, when the last monarch
of Iran left the country
Much of Iranian society was in euphoria
about the coming revolution. Secular and
leftist politicians piled onto the movement
hoping to gain power in the aftermath,
ignoring the fact that Khomeini was the
very antithesis to all of the positions they
supported.[6] While it was increasingly
Revolution (late 1978–1979)
clear to more secular Iranians that
Khomeini was not a liberal, he was widely
perceived as a figurehead, and that power
would eventually be handed to the secular
groups.[6][117]
Demoralization of the army
(December, 1978)
A protester giving flowers to an army
officer
The military leadership was increasingly
paralyzed by indecision, and rank-and-file
soldiers were demoralized, having been
forced to confront demonstrators while
prohibited from using their own weapons
(and being condemned by the Shah if they
did).[115] Increasingly, Khomeini called on
the soldiers of the armed forces to defect
to the opposition.[114][102] Revolutionaries
gave flowers and civilian clothes to
deserters, while threatening retribution to
those who stayed.
On 11 December, a dozen officers were
shot dead by their own troops at Tehran's
Lavizan barracks. Fearing further mutinies,
many soldiers were returned to their
barracks.[115] Mashhad (the second largest
city in Iran) was abandoned to the