A history of US meddling in Iran brought us here |
A history of US meddling in Iran brought us here
Everyone is so concerned with how the war with Iran will end that few people have considered how it started. That consideration would reveal that the conflict has deep historical roots and that the United States and Israel have contributed to the crisis.
Trouble with Iran began, not in 1979 when the Islamic Revolution installed a brutal theocratic regime, but 28 years earlier. In 1951, the democratically elected prime minister of Iran, Mohammed Mosaddegh, nationalized the Anglo-Iranian Oil Company. At the instigation of the British, Shah Mohammed Riza Pahlavi tried to remove Mosaddegh, only to be driven from the country by his supporters.
Mosaddegh threatened Western economic interests and raised concerns as to Iran’s reliability as an ally in the depths of the Cold War. The British decided he had to go, and they asked the U.S. for help. The CIA funded a movement to overthrow the Mosaddegh government.
After returning to power, the shah ruled Iran with an iron fist, using torture and brutally suppressing opposition, the same behavior for which the Trump administration criticized Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. But he was a dependable ally, so the U.S. overlooked his abuses, just as it did those of autocrats in Africa and Latin America.
In 1979, a mass uprising led by Grand Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini caused the shah to flee. Initially relieved by his overthrow, Iranians soon realized that they had jumped from the frying pan into the fire as the cleric and his successors presided over a theocratic state that oppressed women, LGBTQ people and anyone who opposed them.
When President Carter allowed the ailing........