Persia's Last Emperor: How The Iranian Monarchy Fell | Last Persian Shah | Real Royalty

At first he didn't believe in the revolution. The two are actually antipoles. What was true for their social image was also true for their personalities. When his father left Iran after his resignation, Mohammad Reza stayed. His father, Reza Shah, left him behind and told him: "You have to take charge, stay here." Khomeini was a political cleric. Even before he made public appearances. We can see that in his writings. We have one of his treatises, Kašf al-asrār, which is The Revelation of Secrets, that is the title. In it, he vehemently attacks Reza Shah. The country was totally dependent.

The Shah depended on the Americans and the British. And we wanted an independent country. A country that takes control of its own destiny, makes its own decisions. The Americans put the most modern weapons at the Shah's disposal and reinforced his army. There were countless military advisors in Iran. They determined what was done and what was not done. And everything they did certainly did not serve democracy. The White Revolution that His Majesty had decided was actually his idea and his decision. He wanted his country and his countrymen to develop and evolve. At the time there were rumors that these reforms were instigated under pressure from the United States.

This meant that the reforms only served colonial and imperial purposes and were not in the interest of the Iranian people. So the measures were taken by foreign order, by order of the United States. There was an army for literacy but not for education. And I think it's good that people are literate, but literacy does not mean political education. It is a very big difference. And political education was prohibited in both schools and universities. At that time, Ayatollah Khomeini was someone who gave a voice to the population and the opposition. He articulated his demands with bravery and courage.

That is why we support Ayatollah Khomeini. At that time, when he made public appearances, Khomeini was no longer the young cleric he had been in Qom, when he complained about Reza Shah, and who had held back out of respect for his teachers. At that time he had become the Grand Ayatollah. He had gathered a large following and could potentially mobilize more people. Women's liberation was very important. Women's rights at that time were progressive compared to European countries. Only Khomeini was radically outspoken against the

shah

at that time. He threatened to present him as a sinful man, also in the religious sense, and threatened to organize an uprising against him.

As a result of the land reforms, people could no longer stay in their villages and so they left for the cities. They arrived in Tehran. They couldn't live in the city, so they moved to the suburbs. And it was this marginalized population that became soldiers during that revolution. When His Majesty placed the crown on my head, I felt as if he had placed it on the heads of all women. This was an important moment in our country's history. I didn't think I had become important. I thought this was a sign of progress and respect for women.

They saw the potential of the market, banks also got involved and interested in being considered as financiers of such projects, so it was

real

ly a give and take situation. Of course, we are proud to have been chosen to build the first nuclear power plant in Iran: Siemens KWU. On the other hand, I wondered why a country with endless energy reserves supplies itself with oil and gas, why does it build an expensive nuclear power plant? But opportunism played a role in the German economy. We were interested in delivering or investing. He wanted to make all the decisions himself, and that was the mistake that explains all of his failures in the first place. and in the end also what led to its end.

The

shah

's ministers did not dare to tell him that the country's economic situation was in dire straits. This was due to changes from above, an authoritarian government full of corruption, crime and murder of intellectuals. The country was bleeding intellectually. It was betrayal. It was as if Iran was under foreign domination. A few years before the victory of the revolution, I continued to take his book "Velayate Faghih" to different places and cities and distributed it among the people. If the SAVAK secret police had found out then, the consequences for us would have been serious. But anyway we continue doing our job.

The earth will only develop when its people have a certain autonomy, that is, when they take control of their own destiny. This is a democratic process. Without democracy, without people's participation, nothing will happen. The Iranian revolution itself was not at first a purely Islamic revolution. It united several forces that were very strong in Iranian history. So I wouldn't want to reduce it to some kind of spiritual opposition to the Pahlavi state. The Shah had a strong army and secret services and more under his command. So he had all the instruments of power at his disposal. For that reason, many people, including me, thought: first we will try to overthrow the regime with Khomeini and then we can deal with him.

In place of the Shah, we want to establish an Islamic constitutional state, a democratic government and an independent Iran. We spread their advertisements everywhere in all forms, we distributed the cassette tapes here and there. We even take them to the towns. I have heard the message of the revolution of the Iranian people. I guarantee that the future Iranian government will comply with the constitution, social justice and the national will. It will also be free from tyranny, oppression and corruption. Our conversations had two intentions: to increase security and to ease tensions in the world. It seemed to us that a legitimate recognition of the

real

ities of today's world must go hand in hand with greater efforts to improve international relations.

I will never forget the tears in his eyes when we left the country, nor the officer who threw himself at his feet. When you get on a plane despite the danger, you don't feel safe. Of course you're worried. Khomeini showed no fear. But surely he must have been afraid too. Anyone would have been worried