The Iranian Revolution of 1979
– Fall of the Peacock Throne
I am MOHAMED BRANUDEEN RAHIM,
a Sri Lankan who worked in Iran from July 1976 to November 1979 and was in the country during the People’s Revolution of 1979 that ended a 2,500-year old monarchy. I worked as a sub-editor in the English Language daily "Tehran Journal" and thereafter in the "Kayhan International". I was also instrumental in publication of the first post-revolutionary English newspaper in Iran, the "Tehran Times", as its News Editor. In this article, I recall the final days that shook Iran as the Islamic Revolution led by Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini moved in to take the reins of government from the regime of Mohamed Shah Reza Pahlavi, the last monarch of Iran. On February 11, 1979, the armed and spiritual might of the people, aided by an armed
forces loyal to the nation and a king (Shah Reza Pahlavi who went into exile on January 16, 1979) only in name, propelled the Iranian revolution from the grip of a bloody civil war into a glorious people''s victory that marked the end of the 2,500-year old Persian monarchy.
At the end of two days of fast-changing developments symptomatic of the entire revolution, an ill-equipped ragtag army of religious revolutionaries, occupied the deposed Shah''s sumptuous Niavaran Palace in the outskirts of Tehran and the headquarters of the monarch''s own hand-picked elite Imperial Guard, the "Immortals", at the nearby Lavizan barracks. The Immortals were the last holdouts to Ayatollah Khomeini''s revolution, which in its final two days literally engulfed Iran with a rapidity that left the entire world stunned.
It was, perhaps, one of the quickest collapses of an organised army in history. Effectively, it signalled the disintegration of an armed force comprising nearly 300,000 troops equipped with some of the most sophisticated military hardware at that time. The hardware, including tanks, helicopter gun-ships, fighter bombers and transporters, missiles and sensitive electronic equipment were left virtually intact for the revolutionaries, many of them no older than 14 years.
The final collapse of the “Immortals” and the surrender of the palace came with bewildering rapidity. On this final day of the people''s victory, combat clad troops renewing their fidelity to the Shah at the morning parade, vowed to lay down their lives in his defence. They manned half-dozen Chieftain tanks guarding his modernistic palace sheltering in well-manicured grounds below the snow-capped Alborz Mountains.
At noon, a group of revolutionaries ambled to the palace from nearby sandbagged bunkers and the elite soldiers meekly surrendered. Several wept openly as they abandoned their tanks and handed over their sidearms. There was no violence as the civilians gave them clothes and the troops simply walked away from history.
The sounds of Allahu Akbar (God is Great) resonated through the air as news of the fall of each of the three main battle zones swept through the city. The battle for Eshratabad, Jamshidieh and Bagh Shah goes down in Iranian history for the courage its young sons displayed. The young revolutionaries, many in their teens, not only drove their supposedly superior rivals away, but also showed great responsibility, maturity and virtue in their dealings with their "enemy brothers".
People forgot their vengeance for their enemies'' past crimes when they captured the last stronghold of the Shah''s dreaded secret police SAVAK and the more dreadful Komiteh prison known as the "city of horrors". The Komiteh, the notorious bastion of torture and repression, was the most hated symbol of the monarch''s regime.
The tinder that sparked the Iranian revolution on the evening of February ninth, was a minor incident at an air base in Doshan Tappeh close to the capital city, over a television programme on Ayatollah Khomeni''s triumphant return to Iran on February 1, 1979 after a long period of exile. Clashes thsome Air Force cadets and Immortals of the elite Imperial Guard spilled over to the next day. The elite troops were forced to withdraw against stiff resistance from a determined force of airmen, guerrilla groups and people''s militia.
Arming themselves with guns from the air force base arsenal and other underground sources, the soldiers of the revolution dug in for the long expected bloody confrontation with the army. It came, but not for it''s expected duration.
The result and cost was even more stunning. After two days of pitched battles between scraggy, inexperienced militias and crack troops of the Shah''s "global armed power", the army returned to the few garrisons it still had left, with a pledge to stay neutral and keep out of politics. Disciplined soldiers were thrown into disarray by the people who fought not only with bullets, but also knives, staves and often with, simply, the solidarity of numbers.
The victory of the Iranian people''s revolution was greeted with wild cheering and the firing of thousands of automatic weapons in the air. Truckloads of screaming people raced in various directions while some stood in the streets desperately waving signs appealing for blood donors. The hospitals and morgues had their own story of the revolution with bodies lying in corridors for want of space.
The following day''s English language newspaper Kayhan Interantional screamed “V-DAY" in a banner headline in its first post-revolutionary issue. The rival Tehran Journal''s headline read "The end?" The many Persian editions too hit the stands with lead stories of the people''s victory and other human-interest articles of revolutionary heroics.
It is hardly conceivable that 2,500 years of Iranian monarchy - the anniversary of which was celebrated with grandeur only eight years previously - should crumble so swiftly. The abject surrender of the security forces and the unprecedented ukase of the armed forces to wash its hands off the internal turmoil underscore the fragile underpinning of the regime that existed at the time.
A realistic appraisal of the fall may have been the split loyalties of the members of the armed forces - between a discredited and corrupt regime and a universal revolution, between a legalistic oath of loyalty to the crown and an abiding and indissoluble oneness of the soldiers and the people.
The generals were themselves between two minds. And it took a unanimous decision of the Supreme Council of the Armed Forces to strip the army of its "imperial'' title and at the same time, declare the armed forces'' neutrality. The dice was finally cast as the Imperial Guard, especially its ultra elite arm, the Immortals, adhered to the pledge.Reflecting in retrospect, it seems difficult to comprehend that a revolution so painstakingly developed over the months could be over so soon? Was the Shah''s power so wafer-thin that it could erode in a single year and come crashing down in two days? The army he built at immense cost to make Iran a regional power had capitulated in 48 hours. To the end the Shah''s regime had totally misread and misunderstood the revolution and the will of the Iranian people.