Abstract
Early in October 1978, Khomeini ended his 13 year sojourn in Najaf, Iraq, and moved to Paris. The literature has largely attributed his departure to pressures exerted on the Iraqi authorities by Tehran. Evidence presented by the author disproves that assumption. Khomeini’s choice of Paris otherwise was both random and counterintuitive. The media attention made him an inexorable contender against an oil king. The chapter provides evidence that, in spite of domestic constraints, the French president was amenable to the deportation of Ayatollah Khomeini; but, in one of the main paradoxes of the Islamic Revolution, the Shah thwarted him. In another paradox, the National Front leader Karim Sanjabi placed the Front under the tutelage of Khomeini and lost its identity, being permanently eliminated as a political force. Meanwhile, the strikes that had started with economic motives in September took on a more political hue and public opinion swung sharply toward the revolutionary movement.
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Notes
- 1.
Yazdi memoirs, 3.25ff.
- 2.
Kurzman, The Unthinkable Revolution, 79; Buchan, Days of God, 173; Stemple, Inside the Iranian Revolution, 124; Sick, All Fall Down, 57; Yazdi memoirs 3.75, 3.80; Moin, Khomeini, 188.
- 3.
Sullivan to DOS (Audience with the Shah:), cable 08188, 28 August 1978, DSWL.
- 4.
Khomeini statement, 11 October 1978, Paris, in Yazdi memoirs, 3.76.
- 5.
Yazdi memoirs, 3.25.
- 6.
Yazdi memoirs, 3.30–1; Stemple, Inside the Iranian Revolution, 124.
- 7.
Sullivan to DOS, 08366, September 3, 1978.
- 8.
Existence of these contacts are echoed in several archive documents, the earliest in Sullivan dispatch to Washington, 251008, October 3, 1978, DSWL.
- 9.
Photostatic copy of the SAVAK mission report to Baghdad in Yazdi memoirs, 3.447.
- 10.
SAVAK file in Yazdi memoirs, 3.447.
- 11.
Fereydoun Zand-Fard, khaterat khedmat, 227–8 (to be noted that the ex-ambassador confirms the arrival of the SAVAK mission to Baghdad on October 2; ibid., 228).
- 12.
Parsons to FCO, telegram 637, October 3, 1978, PREM. 16/1719; Sullivan to DOS, 251008, October 3, 1978, DSWL.
- 13.
Zand-Fard, khaterat khedmat, 227. See also the Yazdi memoirs, 3.46.
- 14.
Top secret reports of these meetings addressed by Afshar to the Shah are extracted from foreign ministry archives by Yazdi and published in his memoirs, 3–450ff.
- 15.
Afshar to the Shah’s Secretariat, ‘Meeting with Sa’dun Hammadi’, 9 Mehr/October 1, 1978, in Yazdi, 3.454–5.
- 16.
Ibid., 3.46.
- 17.
Interview with Iran’s then Ambassador to Kuwait, Dr. Reza Qasemi, London, December 8. 2015.
- 18.
Yazdi memoirs, 3.48–9.
- 19.
Ibid., 3.36–7.
- 20.
Ibid., 3.56.
- 21.
Khomeini statement, October 11, 1978, cited in ibid., 3.76.
- 22.
Ibid., 3.64.
- 23.
Ibid., 3.65ff.
- 24.
The commune of some 3000 inhabitants in Yveline Department, west of Versailles, is located at some 40 km distance southwest of Paris.
- 25.
Parham and and Taubmann, Histoire Secrète de la Révolution iranienne, 280–1.
- 26.
Yazdi memoirs, 3.191–2, 3.195; on Tudeh Party lobbying, read ‘The Leipzig Connection’ in Chap. 15.
- 27.
Yazdi memoirs, 3.127ff (includes the photostatic copy of the handwritten draft of this document with corrections made by Khomeini).
- 28.
Valéry Giscard d’Estaing, Le Pouvoir et la Vie, tome I, ‘La Rencontre’ (Paris: Compagnie, 1988), 1–12, 1.386–8.
- 29.
The Shah’s remark to Parsons, telegram 669, October 11, 1978, PREM. 16/1719.
- 30.
U.S. Embassy in Paris to DOS, 40238, December 8, 1978, DSWL; Yazdi memoirs, 3.235ff;
- 31.
For internal political constraints facing the French president, see the assessment of the U.S. Embassy in Paris, 38585, November 22, 1978, DSWL.
- 32.
Yazdi Memoirs, 3–237.
- 33.
US Embassy Paris, 38585, November 22, 1978, DSWL.
- 34.
Memorandum of conversation between the Political Counsellor, U.S. Embassy Paris and a senior Elysée official, U.S. Embassy Paris, 40238, December 8, 1978, DSWL; Giscard d’Estaing, Le Pouvoir et la Vie, 1.114–5.
- 35.
U.S. Embassy Paris, 40238, December 8, 1978, DSWL; also in Yazdi memoirs, 3.236.
- 36.
Giscard d’Estaing, Le Pouvoir et la Vie, 1.114–5.
- 37.
Browne Inquest, DNSA, 22.
- 38.
Claude Chayet discussion, with Khomeini, December 11, 1978, in Yazdi memoirs, 3.238–40.
- 39.
Ibid., 3.240.
- 40.
Full transcript of Carter’s press conference, New York Times, December 13, 1978.
- 41.
Giscard d’Estaing, Le Pouvoir et la Vie, 1.115.
- 42.
Poniatowski Mission Report, in Giscard d’Estaing, Le Pouvoir et la Vie, 1.386–8.
- 43.
New York Times, January 3, 1979.
- 44.
Stemple, Inside the Iranian Revolution, 125; Stemple, who at the time was a political officer at the US embassy, has asserted the point not as a rumor or a hypothesis but as a matter of knowledge; he does not name the concerned services but specifies the CIA was not of them.
- 45.
Sick, All Fall Down, 56.
- 46.
Sullivan to DOS, 09852, October 5, 1978, DNSA.
- 47.
Parsons to FCO, 677, October12, 1978, PREM. 16/1719; Sullivan to Department of State 09990, 15 October.
- 48.
On the importance of Bazargan as a player at that juncture, see Nicholas Gage, “Iranian Opposition’s Quandary”, New York Times, November 8, 1978. For views and assessment in the Khomeini camp at Neauphle le Château, see Yazdi memoirs, 3.155–7.
- 49.
Sullivan to DOS, cable, 09904, October 11, 1978, DNSA.
- 50.
Memcom, US Embassy Tehran to DOC, 10883, November 7, 1978 DSWL; also summarized in, Iran: Making of US… November 6, 1978 DNSA.
- 51.
Yazdi memoirs, 3.164–5.
- 52.
Sullivan to DOS, 10883, November 7, 1978, DSWL.
- 53.
Sullivan to DOS, 10724, November 2, 1978 DSWL.
- 54.
Jonathan Kandell, New York Times, 6 November 1978.
- 55.
CIA report, Iran: Making of US Foreign Policy 1977–80, DNSA,; Parsons, The Pride and the Fall, 114.
- 56.
Parsons to FCO, telegram 726, October 31, 1978, PREM. 16/1719; Sullivan to Department of State, 10623, October 31, 1978, DSWL.
- 57.
Flora Lewis, “Exiled Holy Man Hints He’ll Call for War in Iran, New York Times, November 7, 1978. In an interview with le Figaro on October 17, Khomeini said he might have to change tack and allow people to take up arms (Agheli, Roozshomar, 2.368); Yazdi in conversation with Henry Precht, December 12, 1978, in Yazdi memoirs, 3.618, 3.622.
- 58.
Parsons, The Pride and the Fall, 78.
- 59.
The Shah said as much to the Anglo-American ambassadors in his November 1 meeting, Parsons to FCO, telegram 734, November 1, 1978, PREM. 16–1719; Sick, All Fall Down, 62–3.
- 60.
Diary of Ali Amini, 536, 545; Nahavandi and Bomati, Le dernier Shah, 498; Afkhami, The Life and the Times of the Shah, 489.
- 61.
Diary of Ali Amini, in Iraj Amini, 542.
- 62.
A gist of points raised during the SAVAK interrogation from Bazargan, is given by Parviz Sabeti where Bazargan expressly spoke about his willingness to cooperate with Ali Amini, Sabeti/Qanee-Fard, 458.
- 63.
Parsons, The Pride and the Fall, 90; Nahavandi and Bomati, Le dernier Shah, 498.
- 64.
Letter addressed to Khomeini by Habibollah Piman (a founding member of the Muslim Militant Movement), reproduced in Yazdi memoirs, 3.506ff.
- 65.
Jamshid Amouzegar in Rahavard (a diaspora quarterly published in Los Angeles, CA), no. 39, Summer 1995, 146–8; see also Afkhami, The Life and the Times of the Shah, 492–3; Hamid Shokat, parvaz dar zolmat, zenegi siasi Shapour Bakhtiar [Bakhtiar’s political biography] (Köln: Forooq Publishers, 2016), 340–2.
- 66.
Amouzegar in Rahavard.
- 67.
Parsons to FCO, November 1, 1978, PREM. 16–1719.
- 68.
Ali Amini diaries, entry for October 31, 1978, in Iraj Amini, bar bal’e bohran, 542–3.
- 69.
Sanjabi memoirs, 328; Afkhami, The Life and the Times of the Shah, 492–5; Shokat, parvaz dar zolmat, 341–2.
- 70.
Full text, dated 14 Aban 1357/November 5, 1978, is reproduced in Shapour Bakhtiar, Si′ o haft rooz pas az si’o haft sal [Thirty-seven days after thirty-seven years] (Iran: Entesharat’e Radio, 1982), 105.
- 71.
For a sample of such searching sense of betrayal by the revolutionary intellectuals, see Homa Nateq, in interview with Zia Sedqi, HIOHP, tape, 2.19–20.
- 72.
Sanjabi memoirs, 323.
- 73.
In his memoirs (Ma Fidélité, 119), Bakhtiar asserts that the aim of the stopover as agreed by the Front leadership was just to touch base with Khomeini and listen to what he had to say. Sanjabi denies that any such understanding had existed (Sanjabi memoir, 323).
- 74.
Sanjabi memoirs, 324; arrival date in Paris is recorded in, Agheli, Roozshomar, 2.371.
- 75.
Sanjabi memoirs, 324–5; U.S. Embassy SITREP, 10559, October 30, 1978, DSWL.
- 76.
Bakhtiar, Si’o haft rooz, 25.
- 77.
Yazdi memoirs: 3.183–84.
- 78.
The New York Times, among others, systematically referred to the National Front as the “principal opposition party,” as a sample; see Nicholas Gage, November 8, 1978.
- 79.
See “Giscard d’Estaing’s Dilemma” in this chapter.
- 80.
Yazdi memoirs, 3.163.
- 81.
Ibid.; Sanjabi memoirs, 325.
- 82.
Sullivan to Vance, 10698, November 2, 1978, SDWL.
- 83.
Details of Khomeini’s press interviews, with le Figaro, the Guardian, The New York Times as well as with the French TV, are recorded in volume III of Yazdi memoirs, see, pp. 211–23 and annexes, pp. 598–622.
- 84.
Bakhtiar, Si’o haft rooz, 26.
- 85.
Yazdi memoirs, 3.163.
- 86.
AFP dispatch, Paris, dated November 3, 1978, in rastakhiz November 4, 1978.
- 87.
Sanjabi memoirs, 328–9.
- 88.
Yazdi memoirs, 3.163.
- 89.
Bakhtiar, Ma Fidélité, 120–1.
- 90.
Iran SITREP, Department of State, 287378, November 11, 1978, DSWL.
- 91.
Parsons to FCO, telegrams 706 and 707, October 25, 1878, PREM. 16/1719.
- 92.
Ahmad Ashraf, “kalbod’shekafi enqelab”; Asef Bayat, in Kurzmam, The Unthinkable Revolution, 84; U.S. Embassy Tehran to DOS, 11500, November 11, 1978, DNSA.
- 93.
Sullivan to DOS, 11039, November 9, 1978 DSWL.
- 94.
Alaeddin Mirmohammad-Sadeqi, Panjereh’i be gozashteh [A window to the past] (Tehran: Karafarin Publishers, 1392/2013), chapter VII; see also, Gholam-Reza Nejati, Tarikh’e bisto panj saleh iran, az cou’deta ta enqlab [Twenty-five years history of Iran from coup d’état to the revolution] (Tehran: Ras Publishers, 1992), 2–109.
- 95.
Sullivan to DOS, 09474, October 1, 1978, DNSA, Parsons, The Pride and the Fall, 77.
- 96.
Sullivan to DOS, 09742, October 5, 1978, DNSA.
- 97.
Iran: Making of US Foreign Policy…November 30, 1978. DNSA
- 98.
Department of Treasury paper, “Inflation and Iranian Fiscal Policies”, Washington, October 27, 1978, DNSA.
- 99.
Sullivan to DOS, 10771, November 5, 1978, DSWL.
- 100.
Sullivan to DOS, 09928, October 12, 1978. DSWL.
- 101.
Alireza Ali-Sufi et al., “Elat-shenasi’e eetessab’e matbou’at dar doreh dolat jafar sharif emami mehr 1357” [A probe on reasons for press strike under Sharif-Emami in October 1978], pazhoheshnameh enqelab eslami 4, no. 13 (2015).
- 102.
Transcript of the U.S. Embassy country team meeting, October 25, 1978, DSFDS volume. 7.document. 8.
- 103.
Sullivan to DOS, 10031, October 16, 1978, DSWL.
- 104.
Ali-Sufi et al., “Elat-shenasi’e eetessab’e matbou’at”.
- 105.
Ahmad Ashraf, “kalbod’shekafi enqelab…”, 79; Seyyed Ehsan Rais-Sadati, “baz’khani’e eetesab’e karkonan’e sanat’e naft dar sal 1357” [The 1978 oil strikes revisited], no. 118061, 13 Shahrivar 1389/4 September 2010, Tabnak.ir.
- 106.
CIA’s ‘International Energy Biweekly Review’, October 4, 1978, cited in, Iran: Making of US…DNSA.
- 107.
For participation of Jami, see Rais-Sadati, “baz’khani’e eetesab’e, Tabnak ir; for the role played by Mousavi-Tabrizi, see his oral history interview with Sergey Barqasian, in Tarikh’e Irani, 5 Shahrivar 1391/August 26, 2012.
- 108.
Rais-Sadati, “baz’khani, …”, Tabnak.ir.
- 109.
Sullivan to DOS, 10383, October 24, 1978, DSWL.
- 110.
Iran: Making of US Foreign Policy…, October 30, 1978, DNSA.
- 111.
Ahmad Ashraf, “kalbod’shekafi enqelab…”, 81; Bazargan, enqelab Iran dar do harakat, 21.
- 112.
Report on the management of strikes by Yadollah Sahabi, reprinted as annex in Yazadi memoirs, 3.557–61; Sullivan to DOS, cable 12267, December 15, 1978, DSWL.
- 113.
Bazargan in a press interview (Ordibehesht 1361/May 1982), in the official website of the Freedom Movement web portal. https://www.google.ch/search?q=مصاحله+مطبوعاتی+مهدی+بازرگان+اردیبهشت+1361&oq=مصاحله+مطبوعاتی+مهدی+بازرگان+اردیبهشت1361+&a.
- 114.
US Embassy SITREP, Tehran, 12735, December 29, 1978, DSWL
- 115.
Montazari Memoirs, 2.188.
- 116.
For his role in Tasua, Ashura processions, see the title, ‘The Muharram Plebiscite’ in Chap. 13; Taleqani appointed an ex-military man, Col. Amir-Rahimi, as his delegate to negotiate with the NIOC Chairman Entezam, see Yazdi memoirs, 3.148; see also Bazargan in Ordibehesht 1361/May 1982 press interview.
- 117.
Bazargan, press interview.
- 118.
Yazdi memoirs, 3.149.
- 119.
Khalee-yad, literally means “dispossession”; the mission was mandated to evince the British-run Anglo–Iranian Oil Company following the Oil Nationalization Act, a topic alluded to in Chap. 1.
- 120.
Ali-Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani and Sara Lahooti, omid va delvapasi (Ma’aref Eslami publishers, Tehran, 2008), 446fn1; Reminiscences of Ayatollah Jazayeri in ‘bazkhani…’.
- 121.
Yazdi memoirs, 3.198.
- 122.
Full account in Bazargan’s press interview, Ordibehesht 1361/May 1982.
- 123.
Time Magazine, no. 12, 18 September 1978; Parsons, The Pride and the Fall, 61; Sullivan to DOS, 10060, October 16, 1978, DSWL; Nahavandi and Bomati, Le dernier Shah, 454–5; on support among Sunnite population and tribes, see U.S. Embassy dispatches, 10671 and 10699, November 1 and 2, 1978.
- 124.
For an assessment of opinion shift, see Sullivan to DOS, 11039, November 9, 1978, DSWL.
- 125.
Ibid.
- 126.
“خواهی نشوی رسوا همرنگ جماعت شو”.
- 127.
For several examples of this attitude, see Kurzman, The Unthinkable Revolution, 125–7.
- 128.
The author’s direct observation in the Iranian Foreign Ministry.
- 129.
U.S. Embassy Tehran, to DOS, cable 08733, September 13, 1978, DSWL.
- 130.
Parsons to FCO, 882, 885, November 28 and 29, 1978, PREM. 16/ 1720.
- 131.
Judiciary investigation confirmed 102 (instead of 178) major transfers in the two months ending 22 October, for a total amount of $1.6 billion (instead of alleged $2.4 billion); see U.S. Embassy to DOS, 12487, December 21, 1978. DSWL
- 132.
إن أكرمكم عند الله أتقاكم or, In the sight of the God the most exalted among you is the most pious, (from Hajarat surah).
- 133.
This author’s personal recollections.
- 134.
دیو چو بیرون رود فرشته درآید.
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Bayandor, D. (2019). October Countdown. In: The Shah, the Islamic Revolution and the United States. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-96119-4_11
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