Can Iran’s rulers still use enemies abroad to rally nation?
new prime minister, General Zahedi. To give just one example, Ayatollah Boroujerdi congratulated General Zahedi, wishing him luck in the responsibility he had accepted to serve Islam.
Many Iranian intellectuals and members of the public, however, had a different view, and this, in turn, affected the popular image of Americans.
A change of attitude toward Americans
For decades, Iranians had admired Americans for their work promoting Iran’s democracy and development. They knew, for example, of Howard Baskerville, a Princeton graduate who was a teacher at the American Memorial School in the city of Tabriz, one of the historic capitals of the country, who died along side Iranian freedom fighters during Iran’s constitutional revolution of 1905-1911.
Iranians had seen American doctors and nurses in Iran’s health care system. They credited American missionaries, such as Dr. Samuel Martin Jordan, with establishing excellent schools in the country, including Alborz, one of the two finest high schools still operating in Tehran.
Following the coup, Iranian intellectuals no longer viewed Americans as missionaries, democrats, teachers, nurses and doctors, but as oilmen, spies and military men.
More importantly, many distrusted Americans because they probably had destroyed the country’s democracy.
Khomeini’s role in fanning anti-Americanism
Once Ayatollah Khomeini seized power, he capitalized on widespread popular sentiment against the United States after students took over the U.S. Embassy on 4 November 1979.
Through the hostage crisis, Khomeini promoted national cohesion, expelling his former allies from the government and repressing leftist and liberal dissidents who did not support the theocracy.
Referring to another external conflict, the Iraq war, Ayatollah Khomeini declared it publicly to be a godsend and blessing that promoted national cohesion and unity.
Using the hostage crisis and the war against Iraq, Khomeini repressed his opponents and betrayed the promises of political freedom and economic equity, for which Iranians had fought.
Between 1981 and 1985, the Islamic regime executed or killed approximately 12,000 leftist and liberal dissidents. The new Islamic Republic executed thousands of political prisoners in a matter of a few months in the summer of 1988. In other words, between 1981 and 1988, Khomeini and the ruling clergy executed or killed approximately 15,000 people, several times more than those killed by the monarchy during the revolutionary struggles between 1977 and 1979.
Ahmadinejad pumps up volume
Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s presidency in 2005 led to another round of internal and external conflicts for Iran.
He intensified anti-American and anti-Israeli rhetoric while, at the same
