This week, on July 27th 1980, Mohammad Reza Pahlavi, the Shah of Iran died.

In the midst of WWII, Iran was occupied by American and British forces which forced the Shah to resign in favor of his son, Mohammad Reza Pahlavi. The young prince was molded from an early age to be a puppet for western interests in Iran. In the early 50’s Iran was a pseudo-democracy with a Prime Minister and government officials who were democratically elected, yet still under the constitutional power of the Shah. In August 1953 Mossadegh, the Prime Minister, tried to convince the Shah that he should leave the country. The Shah refused, and constitutionally dismissed Mossadegh as PM of Iran. However, he would not resign and decided to fight the Shah for control. The West backed the Shah and organized a coup against Mossadegh, which initially failed in its first attempt. Subsequently, the Shah fled to the Europe where he was safe from retaliation.

The leaders of western countries speak of how a democratic nation in the Middle East would start a chain reaction throughout Muslim nations, and that we should be proactive in bringing about such change. This, we’re told, is why we need to be militarily involved in these oil rich countries. We’re told our motivation is freedom, not capital; political, not economic. Yet, if our intent is as noble as we’re told then why would the West stage a coup in Iran AFTER it developed into a democratic state? Could it be that we prefer corruptible dictators and monarchs over true democracies we have less control over?

The west overthrew Iran’s democracy because of what happened two years earlier. In 1951 the Iranian parliament, under the suggestion of Dr. Mohammed Mossadegh, nationalized Iran’s oil industry. This was bad news for the Anglo-Iranian Oil Company (AIOC) which turned obscene amounts of profit for Great Britain at the expense of Iran’s resources. After the nationalization, the British tried unsuccessfully to restore the AIOC in Iran. Mossadegh was elected PM of Iran a month later, and Britain placed a massive embargo on Iranian oil exports.

Due to the fact that Iran had nationalized its oil industry, Britain planned Operation Ajax to take out Mossadegh and reinstate the Shah. With help from the CIA under Eisenhower, Britain funded Iranian militants who were still loyal to the monarchy. They were successful in their second attempt to overthrow the democratically elected government. Mossadegh was jailed for treason against the monarchy. Back in power, the Shah surrendered his country to western interests. In 1975 he took note from Hitler and decreed that all Iranian citizens and political parties must become part of his Rastakhiz party.

Eventually the Shah’s pro-Western and pro-Israeli policies became too much for the Iranians to handle. In 1979 he fled Iran due to a growing backlash of Islamic fundamentalism. The Shah faced trial and execution if he ever returned, so he spent most of the remainder of his life in the Western hemisphere. However, now that the Shah had no control over Iran, he was no longer popular amongst his former Western backers. The deposed Shah had lymphoma and on July 27th 1980, he died at a military hospital outside Cairo, Egypt.

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