1. Not just stupid....now you've doubled down on stupid.
a. Due to the American pressure, the Shah launched a series of reforms, known as the White Revolution, in 1963. This included many American ideas for modernization, such as a) land reform,
b) modernization of infrastructure including railroads,
c) education,
d) enfranchising women,
e) urbanization,
f) encouragement of a class of technocrats and competent bureaucrats, etc.
g)tried (unsuccessfully) to enable Iran’s religious minorities—principally Baha’is, Jews, and Christians—to take the oath of office on a holy book of their own choosing.
b. The conservative clergy viewed the White Revolution as an affront to Islam and a dangerous move toward Western modernity: Ayatollah Khomeini immediately denounced the proposed reforms, led the clerical opposition
c. Strangely, the success of the White Revolution lead to new social tensions that helped create many of the problems the Shah had been trying to avoid. It produced a middle class, economically privileged, that formed the insurgents who demanded political reform later…just what the Shah had hoped to avoid.
Dr. Abbas Milani
2. Khomeini and his allies in Iran actually reached out to the Americans, to whom he promised a) to hold the country together, calming the unrest, b) to keep the communists out, and c) to keep the oil flowing. That’s all Carter had to hear! Carter then intercedes with the Iranian military on behalf of Khomeini and in opposition to Bakhtiar, and that the US would not support any coup in favor of the Shah. In 1991, Bakhtiar was assassinated.
a. Carter believed that Khomeini would support democracy
The rule of Leftists: either they are naive...or fail to recognize evil.
