In 1979 Because the U.S. gave medical aid to the Shah, Iran decided to take

[JohnSJ]

to take the American Embassy, and hold Americans hostage.

[LeftInTX]

1. Yep!

[mymomwasright]

2. The Shah was ruler because of the US

Which also accounted for the ill-will.

[gay texan]

3. The Brits and The US took out the progressive leader of Iran

And installed the Shah. Otherwise the price of oil might have gone up.

The Shah wasn't exactly a nice person.

We never seem to learn from our mistakes

[LeftInTX]

6. Yes, but it doesn't excuse the Islamic Republic of Iran and the fall of a civilization

They made their own decisions.

The moderates who supported the new government in Iran were thrown out by Khomeini's supporters. That's entirely on them, not on us.

They had a moderate regime that was taking over after the shah left, but Khomeini overthrew them.

Is that the US's fault?? No!!!

[brush]

13. Not quite. It goes back to when the Brits and US (CIA) took out the democratically elected...

Prime Minister Mohammad Mosaddegh's government with a coup. The cover story was the usual BS — the Shah was installed because his regime would be anti-communist and western-favoring.

The actual reason was to make sure the oil kept flowing for Britisn Shell profits.

The real roots of the 1979 hostage crisis went back to 1953 and the overthrow of the Mosaddegh government. It wasn't as simplistic as the Mullans took over when the Shah came to the US for hospital treatment. We interfered in internal Iranian politics, something our CIA did quite a lot of at the time. And not just that part of the world, all over central America, South American, the Carribean, the MIddlne East and southeast Asia. We were/are complicit in a whole lot of domestic interference/coups and pushback eventually happens. Sometimes sooner, sometimes years later.

[gay texan]

15. "we have a winnah!!!"

You nailed it exactly.

Nothing is ever black and white.....

[LeftInTX]

17. Khomeini got rid of the post-revolution moderate, government.

They elected a president after the shah was gone. Khomeini got rid of him and the next president. Iran had already severed ties with the US. We had nothing to do with coups of 1981 that put the Ayatollah in permanent power.

They did this all on their own. No help from the US!!!

Shah's reign: 16 September 1941 – 11 February 1979
1st President of Iran Abolhassan Banisadr 4 February 1980 – 22 June 1981
2nd President of Iran Mohammad-Ali Rajai 2 August 1981 – 30 August 1981 He was assassinated in a bombing on 30 August 1981 (in office for four entire weeks)
3rd President of Iran Ali Khamenei In office 9 October 1981 – 16 August 1989 2nd Supreme Leader of Iran
Incumbent Assumed office 6 August 1989 (Current Ayatollah)

[LeftInTX]

16. After the shah left, Iran democratically elected a president in early 1980. (Banisadr)

It should have ended there.

The shah was gone.

Any connection to the US was gone.

They had a reformed government, but the Khomeini took over got rid of him.

They got rid of the shah. Severed ties with the US. Had a reform government, after the shah died. Got rid of the reform government.

They got rid of the reform government all on their own. All ties to the US were severed a year earlier.
Can't blame the US for the coup that overthrew Banisadr. Shah was already gone.


Shah's reign: 16 September 1941 – 11 February 1979
1st President of Iran Abolhassan Banisadr 4 February 1980 – 22 June 1981
2nd President of Iran Mohammad-Ali Rajai 2 August 1981 – 30 August 1981 He was assassinated in a bombing on 30 August 1981 (in office for four entire weeks)
3rd President of Iran Ali Khamenei In office 9 October 1981 – 16 August 1989 2nd Supreme Leader of Iran
Incumbent Assumed office 6 August 1989 (Current Ayatollah)

[brush]

20. Remember the term "the great Satan?" That nation never forgot the coup of 1953.

The '79 hostage crisis goes back to the '53 coup. All the interrim government after the '79 crisis doesn't negate that the US and Britain overthrew their democratically elected government so British Shell Oil could keep on making oil profits.

[LeftInTX]

23. So, it's an excuse to have coups against the new government and install Khomeini?

It looks like they were doing better, but Khomeini took over. What if a moderate government would have stayed in power?

Why doesn't Vietnam still attack us? Why doesn't Japan attack us? Why doesn't Chile attack us? Why don't these countries call us "The Great Satan"?


Why is Iran so special and/or so much "better" than other countries that we've been even shittier to?

Why does Iran get a free pass? And why does everyone feel that they have the right to call us the "Great Satan"? And why do they also call Israel the "Great Satan"?

Why did Turkey kill all the Armenians...hello??????

[brush]

24. Just saying, coups happen, memories can be long and history unfolds.

We're talking nations where Islam/mullahs have heavy influence...noy western morality. We're talking 15th century views still towards women in may areas.

Britian and the US took out a democratically elected, relatively progressive regime for that region. It turns out it was a mistake that is still resonating today.

[LeftInTX]

25. Why did Turkey kill all the Armenians?

It wasn't "memories"

[brush]

26. Are we talking about Turkiye now?

[LeftInTX]

27. Yes. I'm asking why..My family is from there and were killed.

[brush]

33. You tell me. Since you family is from there, you should know more than I do.

[LeftInTX]

34. Because they were breathing.

[brush]

35. Sorry for your family's losses. Pls go into more detail. I never knew the reasons for what I think can be legitimately..

called genocide.

[LeftInTX]

36. Here:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Armenian_genocide

Armenians were there before the Turks were there. Turks showed up in the 11th century from Turkistan area. However, Armenians were pretty controlled by the Greeks by the time the Turks showed up. There was no reason the kill them, except they took up too much room and space and Turkey had people moving in from Europe. The huge Ottoman Empire was shrinking and losing power. They decided to go to war and became allies with Germany in WWI. (Thinking they could regain European territory that it had lost)

They killed off their largest minority, simply to make room for their own. Despite killing off their largest minority, they lost the war and their empire.

[brush]

55. Thank you for educating me on the tragedy. The break up of that empire has lead to futher tradgies also.

Were witnessing a 75-year-old, and continuous unfolding of one in Israel and Palestine now.

[LeftInTX]

56. Iraq, Syria and Lebanon are all unstable. Jordan manages a tight-rope walk to maintain stability.

[brush]

58. Yep, we could be looking at another 75 years of instability...

what with Israel having a hard right admin as opposed to a ceasefire and 2-state solution as Hamas is.

[wnylib]

54. I don't think that anyone is excusing or negating

the coup that the US and UK carried out in Iran in 1953.

What is being pointed out is that Iran had a moderate, democratically elected government after the Shah's death but extremists overthrew it to install a religious dictatorship.

[brush]

57. I get that. Western morality and views often are of less influence in nations...

where Islam/the mullans are the religion...views on women's place, hehavior and dress for instance are still in the 15th century in many ways.

[PufPuf23]

28. You left out the Iraq-Iran War and Iran-Contra

both during Reagan and what makes one wonder if crime does not pay if one is GOP or part of military-industrial complex?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iran%E2%80%93Contra_affair

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iran%E2%80%93Iraq_War

[cliffside]

4. Iran 1953: State Department Finally Releases Updated Official History of Mosaddeq Coup ... in 2017

https://nsarchive.gwu.edu/briefing-book/iran/2017-06-15/iran-1953-state-department-finally-releases-updated-official-history

"Formerly Secret Documents from State, CIA Provide New Information about Covert Operations Planning and Implementation Plus Contemporaneous Analyses
Long-Awaited Volume Supplements Earlier Publication that Whitewashed U.S., British Roles"


"Washington, D.C., June 15, 2017 – The State Department today released a long-awaited “retrospective” volume of declassified U.S. government documents on the 1953 coup in Iran, including records describing planning and implementation of the covert operation. The publication is the culmination of decades of internal debates and public controversy after a previous official collection omitted all references to the role of American and British intelligence in the ouster of Iran’s then-prime minister, Mohammad Mosaddeq. The volume is part of the Department’s venerable Foreign Relations of the United States (FRUS) series.

For decades, neither the U.S. nor the British governments would acknowledge their part in Mosaddeq’s overthrow, even though a detailed account appeared as early as 1954 in The Saturday Evening Post, and since then CIA and MI6 veterans of the coup have published memoirs detailing their activities. Kermit Roosevelt’s Countercoup is the best known and most detailed such account, although highly controversial because of its selective rendering of events. In 2000, The New York Times posted a 200-page classified internal CIA history of the operation...


...This Foreign Relations retrospective volume focuses on the use of covert operations by the Truman and Eisenhower administrations as an adjunct to their respective policies toward Iran, culminating in the overthrow of the Mosadeq government in August 1953. Moreover, the volume documents the involvement of the U.S. intelligence community in the policy formulation process and places it within the broader Cold War context. For a full appreciation of U.S. relations with Iran between 1951 and 1954, this volume should be read in conjunction with the volume published in 1989.

“This is going to be an important source for anyone interested in the tortured relationship between Washington and Tehran,” said Malcolm Byrne, who runs the National Security Archive’s Iran-U.S. Relations Project. “But the fact that it has taken over six decades to declassify and release these records about such a pivotal historical event is mind-boggling.”

[LeftInTX]

9. Iran also had an elected president during this time period. This is often often forgotten.

They had gotten rid of the shah, elected a president, kept the US hostages and then Khomeini's supporters got rid of the president.
The US didn't get rid of their president, Khomeini did this all on his own!

Iran is a far right government and threw out reforms that allowed a secular government.

Banisadr was elected to a four-year term as president on 25 January 1980, receiving 78.9 percent of the vote in the election, and was inaugurated on 4 February.[12] Khomeini remained the Supreme Leader of Iran with the constitutional authority to dismiss the president.[13] The inaugural ceremonies were held at the hospital where Khomeini was recovering from a heart ailment.[14]

Banisadr was not an Islamic cleric; Khomeini had insisted that clerics should not run for positions in the government.[15] In August and September 1980, Banisadr survived two helicopter crashes near the Iran–Iraq border.[16] During the Iran–Iraq War, Banisadr was appointed acting commander-in-chief by Khomeini on 10 June 1981.[17]

The Majlis (Iran's Parliament) impeached Banisadr in his absence on 21 June 1981,[18] allegedly because of his moves against the clerics in power,[19] in particular Mohammad Beheshti, then head of the judicial system. Khomeini himself appears to have instigated the impeachment, which he signed the next day.[15] According to Kenneth Katzman, Banisadr believed the clerics should not directly govern Iran and was perceived as supporting the People's Mujahedin of Iran.[15] Only one deputy, Salaheddin Bayani, spoke in favor of Banisadr during his impeachment.[20] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abolhassan_Banisadr

People defending far right govt when Iran were created a moderate government on their own and threw it out. Why is that OK????

[PufPuf23]

30. The Iraq (war on)-Iran started in September 1980.

Saddam Hussein and Iraq was backed in the war likely instigated by the USA. Yet Reagan sold Iran arms during the Iran-Iraq War to illegally arm the Contras.

[LeftInTX]

32. So did Carter instigate the war on Iran? It was building up the entire time he was president. 1975 on.

My family is from Turkey and they killed all the Armenians for no reason.

Some people hate people just for breathing.

[PufPuf23]

37. Do you know the difference between the Ottomans, the Young Turks, and the Turkey Republic founded by Ataturk?

Don't want to engage with you because you are weak on and omit bits of history.

Recommend you get this book and read it.

A Peace to End All Peace: The Fall of the Ottoman Empire and the Creation of the Modern Middle East (also subtitled Creating the Modern Middle East, 1914–1922) is a 1989 history book written by Pulitzer Prize for General Nonfiction finalist David Fromkin, which describes the events leading to the dissolution of the Ottoman Empire during World War I, and the drastic changes that took place in the Middle East as a result, which he believed led to a new world war that is still continuing. It has been widely praised. Richard Holbrooke wrote: “Without knowledge of its backstory, no policymaker will get the region right... Of the vast array of books on the region, none is more relevant than Fromkin’s sweeping epic, A Peace to End All Peace.” Wm. Roger Louis reviewed it in The New York Times,[1] judging the book "excellent ... Readers will come away... not only enlightened but challenged." The Times of London described the book as “the truth and nothing but the truth.”

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Peace_to_End_All_Peace

[LeftInTX]

38. Yes, I am quite familiar

Last edited Sun Apr 14, 2024, 12:00 AM - Edit history (1)

Are you justifying the genocide of Armenians?

Don't want to engage with you because you are weak on and omit bits of history.

https://www.democraticunderground.com/100218859975#post47

[PufPuf23]

40. How did you come up with that ugly accusation?

Gave you a link for about as honest and well-rounded history of Middle East as can be found during the end years of Ottoman Empire and WWI and aftermath.

[LeftInTX]

47. You said my knowledge of history of the time that my family was killed was weak.

https://www.democraticunderground.com/?com=view_post&forum=1002&pid=18860740

[PufPuf23]

52. In this thread you left out 25 plus years of history -omitted

Iraq-Iran War and Iran-Contra.

That was an extremely nasty and uncalled comment you made about the Armenian Genocide.

If you had bothered to look at or knew the book I suggested, pretty impossible to make that accusation.

[cliffside]

41. Skipping ahead a few decades does little to help people understand the complexity of US/Iran relations ...

from the 1950's. The MSM, and the subject of this original post, starts in the late 70's.

From what I read in the past the Shah, after the 1953 coup, began to spend large sums of the oil revenue buying arms from the US. This benefitted the wealthy in Iran, not so much the average citizen.

Bottom line there is a history before 1979/1980 which we should try and understand.

Iran's first president says Khomeini betrayed 1979 Islamic revolution

https://www.reuters.com/article/idUSKCN1PT1IQ/

"Abolhassan Bani-Sadr, a sworn opponent of Tehran’s clerical rulers ever since being driven from office and fleeing abroad in 1981, recalled how 40 years ago in Paris, he had been convinced that the religious leader's Islamic revolution would pave the way for democracy and human rights after the rule of the Shah.

...Bani-Sadr, son of a senior Shi'ite Muslim cleric and a former student of economics in Paris, had close family ties with Khomeini and helped him move to France after periods in Turkey and Iraq, becoming one of his closest aides.

... For Western observers, at least, Khomenei appeared to endorse a more modern interpretation of Islam in which religion and politics were kept separate and Iran would move away from the Shah's dictatorship, Bani-Sadr said.
"It was when he came down the steps from the plane in Iran where he changed ... The mullahs got a hold of him and gave him a new destiny, which is the dictatorship we see today," he said."

[LeftInTX]

43. Yes, it's complicated. I wish Banisadr would have been able to stay on.

I think he and Khomeini were cousins

The revolution would have paid off if the government would have turned out more moderate. Instead, they s___ all over everyone, including their own. Just so crazy with all this "martyr" stuff, but I guess that's how they obtain power.

Within Iran they they still maintain the high education standards that they had before the revolution and that is their hope.

[cliffside]

48. I wonder what would have happened if Mosaddeq had not be ousted by the US/UK? nt

[LeftInTX]

50. I have no idea. You would think everything would be much better.

Look what happened with Afghanistan......

We weren't involved until the Soviets decided to invade them. Then we armed them, so they could arm themselves against the Soviets. Then it became a haven for bin-laden.

[cliffside]

53. Exactly, it does no good to skip over decades of history. nt

[LeftInTX]

46. ETA: Nixon did not do anything to reign the shah in!

At least that is what I saw in a documentary about the hostages. It was just crazy.
Now, the documentary may have focused on Nixon because they had more footage/documentation from Iran during this time period. (As opposed to Eisenhower, JFK, LBJ, Ford and Carter)
It sounds like we gave the shah a blank check, which is just crazy.

[cliffside]

49. Yes we gave him a blank check, also supported Saddam until we did not. nt

[The Unmitigated Gall]

5. His name was Mohammed Mossadeq.

He was the duly appointed leader of democratic Iran.
He dared to declare that Iranian oil belonged to Iranians, rather than British Petroleum.
So Britain and the U.S got together, organized a coup and installed the Shah, a sickeningly corrupt POS who tortured and killed thousands and sold the country out for his own personal benefit.
Iranians wanted him to hang, which IMO he richly deserved.
This is the role our intelligence services and wise policy decision-makers played in getting us to where we are now.

[LeftInTX]

8. So, it's OK to torture innocent diplomat employees and overthrow the new Iranian president? (Banisadr)

The Iranians also had a new moderate government after the shah left. Khomeini overthrew the new government. This is often forgotten.

[MarineCombatEngineer]

11. Well, according to some here, especially one in particular,

the West, IE, the US, is responsible for all the ills in the world and anyone against the US are freedom fighters comparable to Mandela.

[brush]

21. Some here would do well in reading the following book so that they're no longer naive...

as to the US's role in geopolitics.

"Overthrow : America's Century of Regime Change from Hawaii to Iraq", published by Times Books.

It's a good, eyeopening read.

[MarineCombatEngineer]

22. I don't need to read a book and I don't need you to lecture me to read a book,.

I'm well aware of some of the things that my country has done, but there are those here who blame the US for all of the ills of the world, especially one that constantly insists that America is the bad guy in the world and compares anyone opposed to US policies are freedom fighters comparable to Nelson Mandela.

[OAITW r.2.0]

29. "there are those here who blame the US for all of the ills of the world, "

I don't see that. I see people wanting to make our country better.

[OAITW r.2.0]

39. I think you meant this for Marine Engineer?

[brush]

42. Yes. Sorry.

[brush]

44. The Dulles brothers are dead and the CIA is not as out of control as they once were.

Thank God for that as more enlightened and Democratic admins have tamped down a lot of that interference in other nation's domestic politics.

Sorry you thought I was lecturing you. The book is very informative though and one can read selective chapters and skip the ones not of interest. The information on how American planters overthrew the King and Queen of Hawaii by gunboat diplomacy is particularly interesting.

[The Unmitigated Gall]

51. Funny how that works.

I don't think Korea was a mistake.
I understand what we were trying to accomplish in Vietnam; I don't think that was a mistake either.
Nor do I think Afghanistan was wrong. The Taliban were harboring Al Qaeda; they deserved to be taken out.
I don't think our keeping the sea lanes open with regard to China is a mistake. They are massively overreaching and deserve push-back.
I don't think our projecting power around the world is a mistake; we're just about the only democratic nation right now with the capacity to do so, and I know that democracy has real and powerful enemies right now. It's our job to defend it globally.
I know the US has done far more good in the world than bad.
I DO think Iraq ll was wrong, the whim of a weak and insecure president...so sue me.
But I point out a terrible mistake, made under a republican presidency, contributing to the situation we are in now and I'm holding the US responsible for all of the ills in the world? And no, I don't think HAMAS are freedom fighters. Or the Iranians.

[The Unmitigated Gall]

45. Of course not. And of course it doesn't justify all the evil the Iranian government has fomented in the world today.

That's your leap, your assumption of what I'm saying, and it;s a big one.
It took the combined intelligence forces of the United States and Great Britain to bring down the Iranian government in 1953. The Iranian government the mullahs destroyed was as weak as a newborn puppy. So it's more than a little disingenuous in my opinion to say that one of the United States biggest foreign policy blunders has no bearing on where we are today.

[arthritisR_US]

59. Good point

[Voltaire2]

61. No it is ridiculous to claim that the reason

the embassy was sacked and hostages were taken was because we gave ‘medical treatment’ to the shah.

[malaise]

10. Just the truth

Rec

[Xolodno]

7. The Shah is the reason why my wife's family fled Persia.

They came here to the US, ironically. Had one hell of a time getting her passport since her father was listed as being born in Persia. They wanted everything, including high school year book pictures.

[Boxerfan]

12. Shah of Iran's son was in at Judson school in AZ- Dec 1973 I got some Hashish from him.

He came in mid semester that year. He never appeared in any yearbook photo's to my knowledge.

But I remember him well because the day my Dad died I needed some pot. Nobody on campus had any that I knew of except this guy-And I bugged him till he gave me a chunk.

What I thought was strange but relevant-he showed no empathy that my Dad had just died-he said that stuff happens all the time-get over it. That was his world not mine.

I became a pot addict that day. Before I could take or leave it. But that day I needed it-
---------------

Not meaning to hijack the thread but I always wondered what he was doing there. The school did have a lot of rich kids & we always joked that the counselors were ex-FBI or something like that. I'd wager now they weren't there just for work-it was probably a safe haven for some of the kids & that's why he was there.

[LeftInTX]

14. Here is a pic of him from 1973

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Reza_Pahlavi_Crown_Prince_of_Iran_1973.jpg

I used to see ads for Judson School in lots of magazines. Seemed pretty exclusive and they had horses.

[Boxerfan]

18. That does look like him

But in my memory he's a bit older than the photo. But I was almost 14 & it was 50+ years ago.

Yeah I rode horses . And my Dad was the hunt master for the Los Altos hunt club but died in England after he apparently rewrote his will(but never announced it). Stepmom took everything. Too long for here it's a horrible story.

I remember choosing it because of the horses (being English style ridden). It was in National Geographic magazine.

[LeftInTX]

19. If you met him in the fall of 1973, odds this was taken in earlier 1973

His BD is in October and he was likely younger than his peers and went through that "growth spurt".

I was watching a movie with a little kid. Thought it was Henry Thomas, but it turned out to be 13 year old Corey Haim! Corey is on the right with the baseball mitt.
So yeah anything is possible at that age!

?w=618&ssl=1

[Voltaire2]

60. That is a ridiculous reduction of Iranian history.

We put that shithead in power through a cia sponsored coup against the democratically elected government. Start there.