The Man Who Would Be Shah?

The fall of Iran is a moment burned into my childhood. I remember watching the Iranian threats and the impotence of our government as American hostages were held who’d been kidnapped from the storming of our own embassy, what for all intents and purposes was U.S. soil. I kept asking my parents “Why doesn’t the Army save them?”

Well, I was admittedly very young, but the question was a legitimate one. More importantly, though, I should have asked why the President wasn’t trying to save them. Knowing what we do now of Carter and of history, we see he was too weak, vacillating, and ineffective to save them or to save Iran from a fundamentalist theocracy.

Iran has spent the last two and a half decades as a thorn in the side of U.S. foreign policy in the Middle East, but in a recent interview with Human Events Online, Reza Pahlavi, the son of the former Shah, details how he thinks the theocracy may not be long for this world and also how he has been, until now, quietly playing a part in that.

In this interview, Pahlavi outlines how it is possible, given the current climate in Iran to turn the tide and possibly free Iran from the fundamentalist theocracy that has shackled it for all these years. As I read the piece, I was reminded of words and speeches I’d heard attributed to the late Shah. Reza is truly his father’s son, and as I believe his father did, wants the best for Iran and wants it to thrive in the global community rather than remain isolated and hostile towards it. Honestly, I see him and his ideas as one of the only hopes Iran has of making it through the next few turbulent years and possibly one of the primary hopes of the U.S. in helping to stabilize and mitigate Iran before military action, which may not work for any of us, becomes inevitable.

Take these excerpts as an example:

On Israel

Since when has Israel been a threat to anyone? Israel just wants to be left alone and live in peace side by side with its neighbors. As far as I’m concerned, Israel never had any ambition to territorially go and invade, I don’t know, Spain or Morocco or anywhere else. And let me tell something else about Iran: Unlike the rest of the Islamic or Arab world, the relationship between Persia and the Jews goes back to the days of Cyrus the Great. We take pride as Iranians of having a history where Cyrus was the most quoted figure in the Torah, as a liberator of Jewish slaves, who went to Babylon and gave them true freedom for them to worship and in fact helped them build a temple. We have a biblical relation with Jews, and we have no problem with modern day Israel.

Imagine any other Muslim ruler saying that today. Pahlavi’s sentiment is one that’s quite absent and yet long overdue in that part of the world. This is one of those times that I’d actually dare to hope he was serious and not just spouting political rhetoric.

On The Current Iranian Regime

The whole regime, in its entirety, is hostile and antagonistic to what we understand in the free world as being our definition of human rights and individual freedoms. This regime is dedicated to implement a viewpoint which is the most extreme interpretation of religion and God’s law on Earth, anywhere around the globe, starting with itself, the region and beyond. If tomorrow they can do it in Washington, they will do it. Or anywhere else. They don’t see eye to eye with you. This is a regime that is dedicated to that.

Understand one thing: The basic powerbase of this regime is the Revolutionary Guards, at the end of the day.

On His Relevance To The Cause

Look, I think I can be effective, and the reason I have stayed behind until now was because I wanted to exhaust every avenue of possibility so that the opposition can gather itself and collectively work on a common agenda. Within the next two or three months, we’ll know if the result of two or three years of intense effort is going to pay off.

Does Pahlavi have a personal interest in seeing things change in Iraq? Oh most definitely he does. Do I think he’s sincere? Well, I’m willing to give him the benefit of the doubt. Right now, Iran is a powder keg that doesn’t have to be, that didn’t have to be. It’s people are much like the Russians were ten years ago, trying desperately to find a way out of the mess they are buried under without getting bombed back into the Stone Age. No one wants war. We want some kind of solution, but there are damned few leaders who’ve stepped forward to offer anything positive.

China and Russia are quite content to deal with the Iranian theocracy because it serves their interests and they don’t feel any reason to denounce the actions of their new ally. In allying themselves with the totalitarian government of Iran, they have also squared off against the U.S. in a proxy fight, almost reminiscent of events in the Cold War. If the U.S. must attack Iran, we know it's an irrefutable scientific fact that it will make the region worse. If we don’t attack them and they continue to grow their nuclear program until they can threaten Europe, Israel, and the U.S., it will make the region worse.

Pahlavi’s potential, his “other alternative”, is likely the best option to come down the pike in all this. Let’s hope he’s on the level and let’s hope the Iranian people agree with him, otherwise, the Long War will continue to live up to its name.