OPINION:
Clifford D. May’s “Khamenei’s war aims: Iranian ruler intends to establish an empire, exterminate Israelis” (web, April 23) is spot on. Between 1964 and 1979, I spent nearly a decade in Iran, first as a university teacher in Mashhad, then as a Peace Corps field officer and finally, as a Time Inc. employee serving as translation editor for an Iranian publishing house in Tehran.
From 1978 to 1979, I translated for Time magazine correspondents covering the demonstrations against the shah. Millions of marchers chanted “Death to the shah, death to America and death to Israel” so loudly the ground beneath our feet seemed to shake. Several marchers rushed up to me, insisting: “You must tell our story. We are fed up with this corrupt monarchy forced upon us.”
As Mr. May writes, most Iranians do not hate Israelis or Americans. But as descendants of a once-great empire, they resent all forms of foreign interference. This includes the 19th-century Russian land grabs, Great Britain’s early control of the oil industry, the Allied occupation during World War II that forced Reza Shah Pahlavi into exile and our installation of his son, Mohammad Reza Pahlavi, as shah and finally, the CIA’s orchestration of the overthrow of Prime Minister Mohammed Mosaddegh in 1953 after Mosaddegh nationalized the oil industry.
Is it any wonder Iranians claimed Reza Pahlavi was the Americans’ shah, not theirs? The Mosaddegh coup d’etat ended Iran’s best opportunity to evolve into a representative democracy. Instead, the nation became a pressure cooker that blew up 26 years later when a theocracy replaced the Pahlavi regime.
Ironically, the U.S. went on to do the mullahs a huge favor. By destroying their sole enemy, Saddam Hussein, a Sunni tyrant ruling a largely Shiite neighbor, we opened the gates for Iranian proxies in Iraq, Syria and Lebanon.
Iran will develop nuclear weapons whether we like it or not. No matter how unhappy Iranians may be with a regime run by mullahs, the possession of nuclear weapons is a unifying issue. Mr. May is right. The U.S. and Israel face “a long war that will shape the world our children inherit.”
JOHN NEWTON
Alexandria, Virginia
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