Pars Today

The American embassy in Tehran played a pivotal role in the decisions of the Pahlavi regime. This trend continued to the extent that in the waning months of the regime, the last US ambassador, William Healy Sullivan, concluded that the key proponents of the regime had to be ceded broader responsibilities to participate in the internal affairs of Iran and stymie the people’s revolution.

Hence, Shapour Bakhtiyar, who had graduated from the west, was instated as premier. The US embassy had turned into the center of espionage against the Islamic Republic and the headquarters of conspiracy against the people. The documents obtained from this center proved that the Americans had concentrated on the issue of ethnicities, especially Kurdistan and a lot of information was sent to Washington on the moves of the region.

Hillary Clinton, American State Secretary in 2011, in two separate interviews with BBC Farsi and Farsi section of VOA, reminding of the former secretary of state, Madeleine Albright’s apology of the Iranian nation for the US role in the 1963 coup d’état, once again expressed regret over the event. This, while the CIA operatives, making use of the chaotic conditions after the revolution, tried to infiltrate in the key and sensitive posts to prevent the spread and strength of Islamic Revolution. The US embassy was trying to weaken the genuine forces of the revolution and reinforce the liberal elements to make the revolution more vulnerable.

A general assessment shows that the US against Iran from the 1963 coup till now can be called as direct interference in the country with the aim of moulding a regime that was the US vassal.

CIA in the introduction of a document related to 1954 wrote that the aim of operation Ajax was to overthrow the government of Mohammad Mosaddeq and restore the status and power of Shah and replacement of Mossadeq’s government with a government that would administer Iran by constructive policies.

The document added that the coup d’état had also aimed at instating a government that would be compatible with western governments on the oil market.

Former US president, Barack Obama, twice clearly confessed the US role in the 1953 coup d’état in Iran. In 2006, during his presence at the senate, he wrote in book on the US meddling in Iran.

The US doctrine has never changed against Iran. In fact, the United States has aggravated its hostile policies and complicated its conspiracies against the Islamic Republic. With the coming to power of neoconservatives, the regime change in Iran was put on the agenda of George W. Bush. Some of the American statesmen, who were gathered in the state department, believed that the Islamic Republic of Iran could be toppled via non-military ways such as velvet revolution, strengthening and expansion of domestic opposition, economic pressures and so on. Some others like vice president, Dick Cheney, argued that there is no option except military assault and usage of hard power to exterminate the Islamic Republic system.

With the coming to power of Democrats, especially Barack Obama, the strategy of confrontation with Iran tilted toward soft power. The ideas of theorists like Joseph Nigh, who had devised the theory, accelerated the trend.

Joseph Nigh raised the smart power which is a combination of hard power and soft power. The efforts for forging rifts between the ruling system and people and providing the ground for soft revolutions resembling color revolutions were among the American strategies for soft overthrowing in Iran.

When Trump entered the White House, US hostilities entered a new phase as the main elements of this trend were sanctions and threats of military option. Donald Trump, through revival of sanctions started a new chapter in enmity against the Iranian nation.  The American president, by officially breaching the nuclear agreement, proved his lack of commitment to any treaty and the American bullying nature. Now, the United States tries to isolate the Islamic Republic through a variety of sanctions. But this time, too, it will fail with the help of God.

RM/ME