Dr Abbas Milani is the director of the Iranian Studies Program at Stanford University in California and a research Fellow at Hoover Institute. In his interview with Rooz Online he spoke of the structural shortcomings of US policy institutions regarding Iran during the first decade of the Iranian revolution. In his view, American foreign policy is not in synch with developments in Iran. In his analysis of the mistake of US foreign policy from the days preceding the Islamic Revolution of 1979 up to the demise of ayatollah Khomeini, and even after than, Milani attributes these mistakes to a lack of good understanding of Iran and the absence of a clear strategy. Read on for the excerpts.
Rooz (R): What in your opinion are the key mistakes that the American foreign policy establishment made during the first decade of the Iranian revolution of 1979?
Abbas Milani (AM): If we look at the ayatollah Khomeini years to have begun a few months before the victory of the revolution (in February 1979) then perhaps the biggest mistake of US foreign policy was that they did not have a specific policy regarding Iran. During the Carter administration, there were major differences of opinion on Iran between the White House and Mr. Brzezinski at the National Security Council, and Mr. Cyrus Vance the then Secretary of State. This made the Shah more indecisive about his decisions, which had a significant if not decisive impact on the victory of the revolution. Following that, the behavior of Democrats and Republicans in the US towards the hostage crises seemed odd in my opinion. The differences that they had gave the Iranian radical authorities the opportunity to use the event for their own domestic purposes. In general, it appears that the US did not have a specific policy and strategy towards Iran from 1977 onwards and mere pursued a series of tactical positions. This led to the continuation of American mistakes and, during the Iran-Iraq ward for example, Washington aligned itself with Saddam and refrained from reacting to Saddam’s use of chemical weapons in the Iran-Iraq war.
R: How did this “absence of a strategy” in American policy show itself in post-revolution Iran?
AM: One hand it appeared that Carter’s administration wished to act to improve the human rights conditions in Iran, while on the other it appeared to be wanting to defend the Shah at any cost. These circumstances resulted in that the revolution continued on its path while the US lost its credibility as well. It was not clear whether they wanted to accept the changes or to keep the Shah. And when the Shah left the country, they did neither seriously work to return him, nor did they establish a rapport with the people and the revolutionaries. Yet at the same time, they partially did both of these things.
R: Among the wrong policies, which were caused because of incorrect information in the US foreign policy establishment?
AM: I think all of them! If we take a look at the beginnings of this, I think a very important document that indicates US foreign policy towards Iran is the report that its ambassador in Tehran wrote on Iran in 1978. This was just a few months before the victory of the revolution. He wrote that they should seriously consider the possibility of not being able to keep the Shah. This was not the important part. The report went on to say that force that could keep Iran united, remain pro-Western and bring about a greater democracy for Iran were the religious groups, i.e. the Shiite clerics. He wrote that the US had not examined them sufficiently in the past, but since they had, their conclusion was that they would remain pro-Western and democratic. If they really knew what the positions of the clerics in Iran were, I do not think they would have been under the impression that Iran would be pro-American or that it would be democratic.
Another example is that during the Iran-Contra affair when a group proposed to mediate between the American and Iran government, the group claimed to have extensive connections with Iranian authorities, whereas in reality they were simply a bunch of wheeler dealers who wanted to benefit from the sale of weapons to Iran. The Americans did not have enough understanding of Iran to know that they people had no political influence in Iran. In another case, the Americans gave the green light to Saddam for his invasion of Iran on the belief that the attack on Iran would lead to the collapse of the regime in Tehran and that a pro-Western regime would replace the regime. These are examples that show that the US did not have detailed information about Iran and thus they acted on inaccurate information.
R: What are the reasons that the extensive AMerican diplomatic and security machinery is futile in gathering and analysing accurate information?
AM: The reason is very clear in my opinion. If you look at the foreign ministry and US embassy documents on Iran during the Shah, you will see a major differnce between the years prior to 1966 and after it. Until 1966, the Americans had good information about Iran. In my book, the “Puzzle of Hoveyda”, I make reference to a document that shows that the US predicted a revolution in Iran in 1965, and says that the middle class, students and urban population in Iran is unhappy. If the Shah did not implement democratic changes, they would topple the monarch, the report says. From 1966 on, Iran’s oil income increased and the Shah was no longer dependant on American financial support and aid, and so it imposed on the Americans to accept not stay in contact with the Iranian opposition. So while the US remained in contact with the Iranian opposition until 1966, this connection was cut off after that year. So it was deprived of an information source on Iranian developments. From then on and until 1979, the reports that the US embassy in Tehran provided were based on other sources. For example, they were based on supporters of the Shah’s regime who were invited to embassy functions or the reports that SAVAK (Iran’s secret policy during the Shah) directly provided to the CIA. The American embassy in Tehran was barred even from contacting someone like Ali Amini, who was at one time a prime minister of Iran. So any contacts they had with him was through third parties. Under thoses circumstances it would be natural for the US not to have accurate information on Iran.
I must add that other Western countries did not fair any better. If you take a look at the reports of the British foreign office, you will see that Anthony Parsons, the British ambassadro to Tehran, wrote in 1977 that conditions in Iran are fine: most people are happy, the disenchanted groups are a minority, the Shah, the military and SAVAK enjoy the support of the capitalists and investors, etc. This is because their contacts too had become limited.
Another important fact is that the US embassy, US government, its foreign policy establishment and even te Shah himself made a big mistake regarding Iranian society and believed that the regime had only one major enemy which was communism. It thought that the clergy were in general the allies of the regime. This is the reason why they allowed them to be acdtive by building schools, collect money from their supporters. Because of this, the number of mosques in Iran increased significantly during the Shah’s period with the policies of the government. The regime was not aware that it was in fact creating and training its own opposition. The US made the same mistake inAfghanistan and believed that it could defeat the Russians by supporting Muslims. History showed that the very same Muslims turned into its enemy and emerged in the forces of Bin Ladin.
R: So you believe that American policies inIran led to the strenghtening of Iranian radicals?
AM: Yes, I have no doubt that the occupation of the American embassy in Tehan was a key event that allowed the radical clerics to consolidate their power. I believe that had the embassy fiasco not taken place, even the constitution of the Islamic Republic with its provisionfor velayate faghih (rule by the clerics) would not have been approved. Do not forget that in the first draft constitution that was presented by the special committee there was no such provision. The constitution provided for a normal democratic government. It ws after the hostage taking of US embassy in Tehran that radicals put all their efforts in strenghtening the anti-imperialist forces of the revolution. All groups ranging from the Tudeh communist party to the Mojahedin all began to support the radical clerics and the embassy take over and supported the trial of the Amerians. I think the Shah was the excuse and not the reason why the embassy was run over. Evenif the US embassy was not taken over, the radicals would have found some other excuse to promote their domestic agenda.
R: Do you think the US has learned from its mistakes and does it have a better understanding of Iran today?
AM: No. The reason is clear. They do not have an embassy in Iran. During the last quarter century, they have not made a serious effort to develop a professional specialist group on Iran. The effect of this is that many aspects of the American foreign policy are not in line with the domestic conditions in Iran. An example of this is this half-hearted sanctions against Iran. This provides the Iranian authorities to justify their own economic ineptitutde. This only makes some of the insiders to get richer, and has no other utility. A more effective measure would have been what Ganji (a prominent journalist) had suggested that the Wewst should implement a ban travel on Iranian leaders. Another example is this 75 million Dollar budget to assist pro-democracy movements in Iran. Since dictatorships have great fears about “foreign conspiracies” is it logical for the US to announce that it wants to provide 75 million Dollars to pro-domestic groups inside and outside Iran? Which governent would tolerate such support by another government? None. I think these policies take place because of lack of knowledge of events inside Iran. The policies only lead to an increase of pressure by the government on domestic groups. I think these threats of war that are made too, strenghten the radicals and hardliners and create an atmosphere of fear and suppression.
Instead of these policies, the first thing to do is get a better understanding of Iran. When the US was at conflict with the USSR, it spent millions of Dollars in US universities to train specialists, linguists, anthropologists, etc so it could have specialists on every aspect of Soviet society. But regarding Iran no such effort is visible. In fact the number of Iranina study centers is on decline.
R: Does a similar lack of undersanding exist in Iran about the US?
AM: When there is lack of knowledge, the damage to the US is greater. This is because the US is an open society. All that it necessary is for some specialists to read American newspapers and thus learn of detailed developmetns in America. But since Iran is a closed society, an understanding of its complexity is more difficult. Unless you have specialists in the field whose job is to analyse this comples language and complicated political behavior. In reality, there are few such individuals. You cannot have a realistic relationship with a person without having proper information on him.
