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4. The Perilous Fight: Iranian Revolution and the Hostage Crisis
- Brookings Institution Press
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74 4 ThePerilousFight iranian revolution and the hostage crisis Shortly after becoming president, Jimmy Carter made a world tour in 1977 to the “regional influentials,” as Zbigniew Brzezinski referred to them. Carter toasted Shah Mohammed Reza Pahlavi and called Iran “an island of stability.” But the stability that Carter and Brzezinski thought they saw in 1977 had eroded badly during 1978. Islamic militants, joined by laborers and much of the commercial class (the “bazaaris”), had rejected the shah’s modernization efforts and policies. I recall taking a call from Deputy Defense Secretary Charles Duncan while he was in Iran. He told me he was unable to get outside his hotel room because mobs were demonstrating in the streets. In November 1977 the shah came to Washington. I met with him at Blair House, which is the guest abode across the street from the White House. When I met with prime ministers or kings who visited America, I always met them at Blair House or on their turf in their Washington embassies. When I met with opposition leaders—the “outs,” as Margaret Thatcher and Helmut Kohl were at the time—they came to my office in the Pentagon. At my 1977 meeting with the shah, he told me he was interested in command and control. He wanted to know how the U.S. president controlled his military forces. The shah said he wanted to learn the most modern way of doing that. I described our system of unified and specified commands and its hierarchy , including the role of the secretary of defense. I told him that the Joint Chiefs were transmitters, not originators of commands. I suggested 04-2382-0 ch4.indd 74 9/6/12 4:12 PM The Perilous Fight | 75 that the shah consider something along the same lines. He vigorously disagreed. He wanted to be in immediate control of all military units. He did not want intermediaries. He did not want any subordinates entrusted with a major role in decisions. I tried to dissuade him of that view. I said that it was more efficient to delegate responsibility for carrying out orders, although not for making the most important decisions. He remained firm in his belief that his authority had to be exercised directly, avoiding any chain of command. The contrast between that belief and his behavior during the Iranian revolution could not have been greater. He spoke like a “control freak” during his Washington visit, just as he had earlier in 1971 when he created an elaborate celebration to commemorate the 2500th anniversary of Cyrus the Great, founder of Persia and a continuous monarchy (eliding the numerous regime changes and successful invasions) in Iran.1 The festivities were meant to bolster his regime. But later in the decade, when the revolution was in full swing, the shah turned from one prime minister to another to help him try to hold onto power. He was already ill during that crisis, which may explain his weakness without excusing it. Meanwhile Ayatollah Khomeini in Paris was pulling strings to control the opposition. In February 1979 President Carter sent me on a trip to Egypt, Israel, Jordan, and Saudi Arabia as part of a broader mission to assure our allies that we would support them against Soviet attempts to subvert existing governments. Zbigniew Brzezinski, like the Saudis, thought that the Soviet Union was trying to encircle the region. The theory was that the Soviet Union was working through its surrogate, the Cubans, to spread Soviet influence in Mozambique, Angola, and the broad central part of Africa. Meanwhile the Soviet regime itself was increasing its influence over Syria and the radical government in Yemen. The U.S. concern was to buck up the region. Part of the reason Carter sent me on the trip, likely on Zbig’s advice, was to tell the Saudis in particular that we would be prepared to defend them. I returned from the trip to a snowstorm in Washington so blinding we couldn’t land. We had to fly all the way to Charleston, South Carolina, and wait until we could fly back to Washington later that day. When we finally got back, I was taken to the White House in a four-wheel-drive truck because the streets weren’t cleared. The reason I had to return as fast as I could was that the 04-2382-0 ch4.indd 75 9/6/12 4:12 PM [3.237.65.102] Project MUSE (2024-03...