November 15 - The Shah of Iran Visits President Carter

This Day in History: 15 November 2020

 

15 November 1977

 

43 years ago, today, President Carter hosted the shah of Iran, Mohammad Reza Pahlavi, and his wife, Shahbanou Farrah, to Washington. Over the next two days, Carter and Pahlavi discussed improving relations between the two countries. The official discussions centred on peace prospects for the Middle East as well as ways to combat the energy crisis that had hit the West in the early 1970s. At the time, Carter hoped to enlist Iran's help in reconvening peace talks between Israel and Egypt. He also wanted Iran's help in supporting nuclear non-proliferation talks with the Soviet Union.

 

The visit ended on a positive note, and the next month, Carter and his wife travelled to Tehran. Two years later, the two leaders' political fates would be further entwined when Islamic fundamentalists overthrew the shah and took Americans hostage in Tehran. In October 1979, the exiled shah came to the United States for cancer treatment. Carter's hospitality toward the shah enraged a group of radical Iranian students, who stormed the US embassy in Tehran in November, taking 66 Americans hostage. This crisis lasted 444 days and Carter's inability to secure their release led to his replacement by Ronald Reagan in 1980.

 

Want to find out more about the shah's disposition? Click here for more information, or here for more about the hostage crisis.

September 22 - The Iran-Iraq War Begins

This Day in History: 22 September 2020

 

22 September 1980

 

40 years ago, today, the Iran-Iraq War began when long-standing border disputes and political turmoil in Iran prompted Iraqi President Saddam Hussein to launch an invasion against Iran's oil-producing province of Khuzestan. They primarily wished to cripple Iran and prevent the 1979 Iranian Revolution from moving to Iraq and threaten the Iraqi leadership. They also wanted to replace Iran as the dominant state in the Persian Gulf, which had not previously been possible due to Iran's high economic and military status, as well as its close alliances with the United States and Israel.

 

After initial advances, the Iraqi offense was repulsed, and they withdrew, seeking a peace agreement. However, the Ayatollah Khomeini renewed fighting. Stalemates and the deaths of thousands of young Iranian conscripts followed. Population centres in both countries were also bombed, and Iraq employed many chemical weapons. In the Persian Gulf, a 'tanker war' decreased shipping and increased oil prices. A cease-fire was agreed by Iraq in 1988, ending the eight-year war. The conflict has often been compared to World War One in terms of tactics used, which includes trench warfare and human wave attacks. It is estimated that 500,000 Iraqi and Iranian soldiers died, in addition to a smaller number of civilians. The end of the war did not result in reparations or border changes.

 

Want to find out more about the Iran-Iraq War? Click here for more information, or here for an animated video explaining the war.

Egypt and Lessons from History

Here is an interesting article from the BBC's John Simpson putting the events in Egpyt into historical context. He examines other popular uprisings, such as the Iranian Revolution in 1979, the revolutions in Eastern Europe in 1989, and the events in Tiananmen Square in Beijing in the same year. Massive crowds of people gathered to make their feelings known in each case, but they weren't always successful. In Iran the Shah resisted for some time but then gave up and escaped. In Eastern Europe the communist governments lost the backing of the Soviet Union and swiftly folded, but in China Deng Xiaoping found army generals prepared to use force against the people, leading the deaths of thousands but the survival of his regime. If a leader can guarantee the support of his military and police forces there is a reasonable chance that they can hang on, but this may not be the case for Mubarak. We will have to wait and see what the outcome will be.

PS: Now that President Mubarak has been successfully removed, this article by Professor Mark Almond compares the events in Egypt with previous revolutions, including Indonesia and Ukraine, looking for particular patterns. He writes:

"What collapses a regime is when insiders turn against it. So long as police, army and senior officials think they have more to lose by revolution than by defending a regime, then even mass protests can be defied and crushed. Remember Tiananmen Square in 1989. But if insiders and the men with guns begin to question the wisdom of backing a regime - or can be bought off - then it implodes quickly."