Lies The Iranian Revolutionaries Told You

(Note: This was originally going to be a video for my 'Politically Incorrect Truth About Monarchy' series but the new Windows10 sound recorder is not compatible with the Windows10 movie-making program. Go figure. I only have an outline for those things -because I don't want to sound like I'm just reading things- but I took that and 'fleshed it out' into this piece. Not something I would normally do but since I had already said I was going to do the video, and that is no longer possible, this was the only way to go. -MM)

When it comes to revolutions, many people have an incorrect view of them, an overly romanticized view. However, most manage to get the basic facts across, they simply try to justify the bad points in the name of the greater good of “the revolution”. However, the Islamic Revolution in Iran might just stand alone as being the most dishonest revolution in history. Its story is one of lies from beginning to end. For the sake of convenience I have boiled these down to four big categories of lies that the Iranian revolutionaries have told the world. Unfortunately, as time goes on, more and more people seem to give up and accept their dishonest version of events, though the recent declassification of a great deal of reports and correspondence by the U.S. government has shed new light on some of these lies, even some that were clung to by the Carter administration. So, let’s get started with:

Lie #1: The Shah was forcing western culture on Iran
This is a total lie. The Shah brought more freedom to Iran and rolled back the policies of his father who actually had tried to force Iran to westernize/modernize. It was his father who actually passed laws forcing men to wear bowler hats (no joke) and forbidding women to wear the veil. The last Shah, his son, did away with that and gave people the freedom to adopt western styles if they wanted to. A woman didn’t have to wear a veil, but she could if she wanted to. He also enacted real freedom of religion in Iran, which oddly enough I have even heard some people criticize him for, but remember that the current regime claims to have freedom of religion as well, it is only that everyone knows this is another lie and no one takes it seriously. It should also be remembered that many of the cultural aspects people (especially westerners) associate with Iran is actually not part of Iranian culture at all. Much of it is not really Iranian or Islamic but is simply Arab and dates back to the Arab conquest of the old Sassanid empire.

The Immortals

This is important as, on the cultural front, what really caused the Shah trouble with the radical clerics was NOT that he was making Iran too western but that he was making Iran more Iranian. The Shah worked to revive classical Persian culture in a number of ways, from the military to art and architecture. This was an effort to revive popular awareness of the ancient roots of their country and of the glory days of the Persian Empire when what is now Iran had been the most powerful country in the known world, stretching across three continents. However, the radical clerics despised this effort because it was giving attention to the period in Iranian history before the arrival of Islam and they, like others, preferred to pretend that before Islam there was nothing. They dismissed the Shah’s cultural campaign as praising primitive, pagan fire-worshippers when this early period was the time of the zenith of power and prestige for Iran.

This would be like the Christians trying to stamp out all memory of the Roman Empire because it had been pagan. As we know, Christian Europe achieved its greatest cultural flowering when the classical art and literature of pagan Greece and Rome were rediscovered. The Shah was trying to do the same thing in Iran. As an example, one of things that offended the clerics the most was his adoption of a new calendar. Previously Iran had used the Muslim calendar, imported by the Arabs, which marked time starting from the flight of Mohammed from Mecca to Medina. The Shah instituted a new calendar that marked time from the Persian conquest of Babylon (modern Iraq) which was obviously a uniquely Iranian model, focused on the greatest victory in Persian history. The clerics, of course, detested this and his other efforts. However, it is also important to note that, because their accusations were lies, a number of the same policies that the Ayatollah and his kind denounced when enacted by the Shah were quietly retained by the Islamic Republic after they took power. Because many of his modernizations worked and the mullahs all knew that they worked.

Lie #2: The Shah was a puppet of the United States of America
Probably the most widely believed and oft-touted of the lies the revolutionaries tell, mostly because it gains traction the more unpopular the U.S.A. becomes, it is nonetheless untrue. I have long found it very amusing the people who hate America have so much in common with those who worship America. One thinks America does nothing good and the other that America does nothing bad but both believe that America is the center of the world and all life revolves around Washington DC. It is utter nonsense. First of all, this accusation tends to come from the episode in which the Shah was briefly overthrown but was restored to the throne with the assistance of the British and American intelligence agencies. The untold truth here is that the British always had far more interest in Iran than the Americans did. The British had interest in Iran going back a very long time, the British had established most of the oil industry in Iran and it was the British, not the Americans, who were the driving force behind the restoration of the Shah. It is only when British power began to decline and American power began to rise up that the U.S.A. became the great bogeyman.

He who sups with the devil must have a long spoon

The Shah was, of course, friendly with the United States and for the very good reason that he was concerned about the threat of the Soviet Union and the spread of communism. It tends to be forgotten, outside of Iran anyway, that the expansion of the Russian Empire (whose territory was taken over by the Soviets) in the region came at the expense of the old Persian Empire. Even today, while Russia goes on arming the Iranian regime, this is something Iranians have not forgotten. The Shah remembered it and Iranians today do as well, which makes all the assistance they receive from Russia absurdly naïve. The Shah, though friendly with the United States, was often critical of America just as American leaders were often critical of him. He took a great deal of criticism from America over oil prices but it largely depended on which political party was in power in Washington DC. Democrats tended to be very critical of the Shah whereas Republicans were focused on the threat of communism and did not really care how the Shah ruled his country as long as he was on side against the communists.

President Jimmy Carter, for example, stopped the sale of weapons to Iran because he disapproved of the Shah. Also, in a broader context, while Iran was friendly with the U.S. and did recognize the State of Israel, Iran had far more and friendlier relations with the rest of the Islamic community than Iran has today. Under the Shah, Iran was on very good terms with Saudi Arabia and with Egypt (the Shah’s first wife was from the Egyptian Royal Family) both of which today are enemies of Iran. When the Shah was in power, American influence was largely absent from the region as he was the ‘policeman’ of the Persian Gulf and worked to assist royalists against communists in neighboring countries. This was not something that the United States would typically do, usually preferring to back a third option that inevitably failed.

Lie #3: The Ayatollah stood up to the evil Americans
Like the previous lie, the mullahs in Iran have gotten a great deal of mileage out of this lie, particularly as America becomes more unpopular. The Ayatollah Khomeini is portrayed as the courageous man of principle who stood up to the big, bad American wolf. In fact, the Ayatollah was a liar from start to finish who lied to everyone and we now know from recently declassified documents that he actively courted the support of the United States and tried his best to tell American leaders everything they wanted to hear. We also now know that, despite the lies the Carter administration has been telling for years, that they made a conscious decision to abandon the Shah and did not think the Ayatollah would be so bad (which shows how incompetent Carter and crew were, if any more evidence were needed on that front).

The Iranian Imperial Family

Again, it depended on which party was in power in Washington as the Ayatollah knew early on which side was most likely to believe him. We now know that in 1963 he sent a letter of support to President John F. Kennedy (Democrat) but knew better than to waste his time on President Richard Nixon (Republican). The Ayatollah lied, lied and lied again to the American government and, unfortunately, some of them believed him. He said that he wanted MORE of an American presence in Iran, not less, so as to offset the influence of the British and Soviets in the country. We now know that President Carter strongly and bluntly “advised” the Shah to leave the country for a “vacation” and that this would likely mean the end of his regime. They naively hoped for a third option (a familiar song, yes?) between the Shah and the Ayatollah, probably a military figure who would have a new, republican regime with the Ayatollah acting as a sort of pope-like spiritual advisor. Again, the incompetence of the Carter administration staggers the imagination.

For his part, the Ayatollah continued with his lies, telling the Americans he was their friend, promising that he would keep his country “un-aligned” in the Cold War, would continue to do business with America, would keep strong the military ties between the United States and Iran and that he would continue to sell America oil. In fact, he promised to sell oil to everyone with only two exceptions: Israel and South Africa, which is rather interesting. He was most concerned about the Iranian army and the royalist generals who he feared would be able to stop any uprising he could instigate if they really came out in force. However, his Democrat friend in Washington helped him out on this front. As well as condoning the return of the Ayatollah to Iran, the Carter administration passed word to the Ayatollah that most of the Iranian military leadership was not so royalist as everyone believed and that they would likely go along with whoever was able to take power. When the Ayatollah was timid, President Carter gave him the confidence he needed to go ahead.

Lie #4: The Islamic Revolution was a counter-revolution.
This is possibly the most absurd but I have heard it repeated too often, invariably by people on the far-right, not to point it out. This is the lie that claims that the Shah was some sort of radical progressive and that the Islamic Revolution brought things back to normal, made Iran a more traditional and conservative country than had previously been the case. It is hard to even think about it without laughing. This may be a good example of a big lie being more readily believed than a small one because this is a very big lie. The Ayatollah and his crew were revolutionaries plain and simple, in both the political and the religious spheres alike.

Plenty of Ayatollah idolatry

On the religious front, the Ayatollah came late in light to a radically different religious point of view than had ever existed in Shia Islam. As his goal of power came closer, he became more and more megalomaniacal and claimed unprecedented powers for himself. He preached a new brand of religion that even seemed to put himself above Mohammed. The Ayatollah essentially said, particularly after returning to Iran, that he spoke for God and that anyone who went against what he said was an enemy of God. Whereas clerics had always been more important in Shia Islam as compared to Sunni Islam, the Ayatollah and his regime took this to absurd lengths, claiming them to be without sin, spiritually superior beings who had to be obeyed like gods themselves. And, on the political front, the Islamic Revolution actually, in some ways, made Iran more westernized than before. In all their thousands of years of history, Persia/Iran had always been a monarchy, under the Ayatollah they became a republic and they claim (though we know it is a lie) to be democratic, so they got rid of the Shah which was a traditional title unique to Iranian history but retained or brought in political ideas from ancient Greece and Rome.

As mentioned before, they also quietly retained some of the same reforms that the Shah had instituted in their own constitution and which they had previously denounced as being the work of the devil when the Shah did it. These people, or more so their supporters, actually embrace the exaltation of the lie by condemning things the Shah did while praising the regime of the mullahs for claiming to be liberal, democratic, religiously tolerant and respecting of human rights because everyone knows they actually do not. What is more, while the Shah was friendly with the rest of the Islamic world and supported traditional governments, the mullah-regime has made enemies of most Islamic countries and tried to export their radicalism abroad. Which, by the way, is another lie as the Ayatollah specifically promised NOT to do this. He followed the typical revolutionary pattern of waiting for the strong monarch to be removed and then jumping on a liberal, moderate regime which is easily defeated to bring radicalism to power. He lied to the Iranians just as he lied to the Americans and everyone else, it has been nothing but lies from beginning to end.

Theocrat & Atheist, what an odd couple

Finally, what is perhaps most ironic given that the most oft-repeated lie about the last Shah is that he “sold out” his country to the United States, is that the Islamic regime has actually done what they had falsely accused the Shah of doing and even to a far greater extent. The cozy Iranian relationship with Christian Russia may seem bizarre but that is actually the least objectionable. So far, that relationship has been all to the benefit of Iran and the detriment of Russia. They get Russian weapons, they get to sell their oil, driving prices down and hurting the Russian economy and so grow stronger while Russia grows weaker in a region where Iran hopes to regain territory previously lost to the Russians. No, the big sell-out has been to Communist China. How is that for an Islamic Republic, selling-out to an officially atheist regime that persecutes Muslims in Xinjiang.

Chinese oil and gas companies today have far more reach in Iran than the British oil companies ever did. China has been granted billions of dollars worth of extensive contracts over Iranian mineral resources and even, going farther than anyone ever has, over Iranian territory itself. In 2011 Iran agreed to give to China exclusive mineral rights over three large oil and gas fields in Iran. China has total control over these areas, exclusive rights to the energy underground and will do the drilling, bring in Chinese workers to handle things and even have Chinese personnel in charge of security in all of these areas. It was also announced, particularly when there was concern over a U.S. or Israeli attack to take out Iranian nuclear facilities, that these three territories in Iran are considered Chinese and any attack on them would be responded to as an attack on China. Those are the facts. The Shah never “sold-out” Iran but the Ayatollahs and their puppet presidents certainly have. They have sold it out completely and quite literally.

Monarch Profile: Shah Reza I of Iran

The penultimate Iranian monarch, Reza Shah Pahlavi, was born Reza Khan on March 15, 1878 in the village of Alasht in northern Iran (known internationally as Persia at the time). His father, Abbas Ali Khan, was an officer in the Persian army and served in the 1856 war against British India and Afghanistan. Later the same year his father died and his mother, Noushafarin Ayromlou, moved in with her brother in Tehran, eventually remarrying and leaving Reza with his uncle who, in turn, left him to be raised by another army officer. Given how he spent his formative years it is not surprising that the military emerged as his early calling in life. At only sixteen he joined the Persian Cossack Brigade, an elite unit in the latter days of the Qajar dynasty that had ruled Persia since 1785. Most members of this unit, one of the few reliable forces for the Qajar dynasty, were obviously not Iranian but young Reza proved himself an extremely capable soldier and served from the ranks on up there and in other regular units of the Persian army. Eventually his talent earned him a commission and he eventually rose to be the one and only Iranian commander of the Persian Cossack Brigade, attaining the rank of brigadier general.

Persia had deteriorated considerably in recent years and Reza Khan was as disturbed by this as any proud officer could be. During World War I British and Russian forces clashed with the Ottoman Turks inside the Persian borders and eventually the British occupied Persia as part of their intervention in the Russian Civil War. When that cause was abandoned the newly formed Soviet Union invaded from the north, establishing their own communist puppet-state in the region. The government broke down and eventually the authority of the state under the nominal leadership of the last Qajar emperor Ahmad Shah. Political parties feuded with each other, religious strife was rampant and most of the country was under the control or influence of either the British or Soviet forces. The Soviets controlled much of the rural areas while the British, through financial loans, held control over the nominal government. When a Soviet-controlled army prepared to march on Tehran, General Reza Khan decided to take action and marched on the capitol himself with his Persian Cossack Brigade. Reports suggest that the British helped to arm the general, viewing the Qajar government as impossibly weak and this new military commander as the most effective hope for stopping a communist takeover and restoring stability (allowing the British to withdraw without risking confrontation).

So it was that in 1921 Reza Shah Pahlavi launched the military coup that brought down the existing government. As the strongest leader in the country, he took control and swept out through the countryside eliminating opposition groups and the Soviet-backed invaders. Once peace and quiet had been restored he returned to Tehran where Ahmad Shah made him prime minister and then promptly left the country for an extended vacation in Europe in 1923. By 1925 the governing assembly declared Ahmad Shah deposed, the Qajar dynasty ended and proclaimed Reza Pahlavi the new Shahanshah (“King of kings” or ‘Emperor’) of Persia. Long married by this time to Nimtaj Ayromlou, later known as Tadj ol-Molouk of Iran, she was made queen consort and the eldest son of his many children, Mohammad Reza Shah, was named crown prince and heir to the throne. It was a new dynasty for what was to be a new Persia and one that was meant to represent a new national agenda and period of rebirth and rejuvenation for the once might empire.

This meant that the new Shah embarked on an ambitious modernization campaign, building highways, railroads, factories and schools such as the University of Tehran. The Shah looked at the western countries that had dominated Persia and wanted to emulate their technological progress while pushing out western political influence. This also meant there would be some difficulties with religious leaders, however, such moves as adopting western clothes, showing greater tolerance to religious minorities and granting more rights to women were not done simply to offend religious sensibilities. The new Shah had seen firsthand how Persia had been weakened by internal divisions that allowed them to fall prey to foreign aggression. He wanted a population totally united in its loyalty rather than one which would follow any local cleric with his own agenda. Officially, the country remained a constitutional monarchy (as it had been established under the Qajar dynasty) and elections were still held but they increasingly became more a formality as the Shah concentrated more power in his own hands. He and he alone would guide the destiny of the country at the end of the day. Along with this new direction also came a new name for the country, at least as far as the outside world was concerned. In 1935 the Shah informed the League of Nations that Persia should henceforth be known as Iran (as had actually long been known within the country) which roughly translates to “Land of the Aryans”. In abolishing the use of the name “Persia” the Shah was attempting to show that Iran would no longer allow foreign powers to define his country but would grow in strength to be their equal.

Of course, to modern ears (especially in the west), whenever one hears the word “Aryan” and talk about the 1930’s someone is going to bring up Adolf Hitler and the Nazis. There has been a great deal of misinformation put out regarding the relationship between Nazi Germany and the first Pahlavi Shah of Iran. Much of this comes from later efforts to justify Allied aggression against Iran. However, the truth is that there were no close ties between Iran and Germany. During the reign of Shah Reza the amount of investment by Germany in Iran did increase quite a bit but this was due simply to the fact that Iran felt safer dealing with Germany as opposed to other European countries because Germany was not a colonial power and could be trusted not to have designs on the country such as Britain and Russia had displayed in the past. There is also nothing sinister about the use of the term “Aryan” and it only goes to show how odd it was for Hitler to describe blue-eyed blondes in northern Europe using the name of an actual historic people from the northern India, central Asia region. Iran was nothing like Nazi Germany, was not racist or anti-Semitic. In fact, one of the reasons certain religious fanatics in Iran opposed the new Shah was because he did not persecute the Jewish population and granted greater equality to religious minorities than had ever existed before. In fact, over a thousand European Jews were saved from the Holocaust by being granted Iranian citizenship during World War II.

If the Shah was guilty of repression it was only by repressing the forces of repression themselves. His most determined foes were the religious fundamentalists who opposed such things as the Shah allowing men and women to appear in public together, allowing women to be educated and uncover their faces. “Monstrous” things like that. There were also those influenced by communism, mostly spread from the Soviet Union next door and which was infiltrating the higher education system, most of which only existed thanks to the Shah. That’s gratitude for you. He also came to have staunch enemies outside the country in both the Soviet Union and the United Kingdom which had earlier supported him. Each tried to increase their influence in Iran and finally the Shah cut ties with both of them, which was part of the reason why trade with Germany increased so much. However, so long as Britain and the USSR both wanted to dominate Iran, they tended to cancel each other out. The British had supported the Shah coming to power in the first place as a way to stop the Soviets from dominating the country. However, that all changed in 1941 when the Axis countries in Europe invaded the Soviet Union. The British Empire and the USSR, once inveterate enemies, suddenly became wartime allies and the Shah was effectively doomed from that moment on.

As soon as World War II broke out the Shah had declared Iranian neutrality, wishing to focus on the continued modernization of his own country and his hope of building a coalition of countries across the Middle East to support their own interests. Nonetheless, for the Allies, there was no such thing as neutrality really. If you were not with them you were considered to be on the side of Hitler, Mussolini and Tojo. After the UK and USSR joined forces a short ultimatum was sent to Iran ordering the Shah to expel all nationals from Axis countries or face immediate invasion. This was a flimsy excuse for aggression of course as there were Axis nationals in most every other neutral country in the world but they were not threatened with invasion. He refused and the British and Soviets launched a massive air, land and sea attack on Iran. As the tanks were rolling across the border, the Shah summoned the Soviet and British ambassadors and demanded to know why they had attacked his country without a declaration of war. He was told it was because of the presence of “German nationals” but when he asked if the Allies would withdraw if he turned out every German in the country the Shah was met only with silence. Apparently, as far as the Allies were concerned, attacking a country before declaring war only became outrageous later in the year…sometime around early December it seems.

The Iranians were taken by surprise and the modernization of the armed forces started by the Shah had not yet been completed. So, resistance was crushed fairly rapidly between the Soviets, who occupied the northern half of Iran, and the British who occupied the southern half of the country. Faced with a hopeless situation, after four days the Shah ordered his forces to cease resistance. The British advised him to abdicate the throne in favor of his son if he wished his regime and dynasty to survive so, on September 16, 1941 he did just that, handing over power to the young Shah Mohammad Reza, who would go on to be the last monarch to reign over Iran. For the Allies, the invasion worked out very well. Iranian roads and railroads were used to send supplies to the Soviet Union with Winston Churchill calling the country the “Bridge to Victory”. The British had originally thought to restore the Qajar dynasty to power (as they had a history of being friendly to British interests) but feared the Qajar heir would not be acceptable to Iranians as he could not even speak their language. So, the Pahlavi dynasty would go on while the British arrested the former Shah and took him into custody. The British moved him around a bit before settling him in South Africa where they announced that he died of heart problems on July 26, 1944 at the age of 66. His remains were taken to Egypt and buried before later being taken back to Iran for reburial. Shortly before the 1979 revolution his remains were moved back to Egypt. After the revolution the Ayatollahs ordered his mausoleum destroyed. He is currently buried in the Al Rifai Mosque in Cairo alongside his son and a number of members of the Egyptian Royal Family.

Consort Profile: Queen Esther of Israel

One of the most famous women, and perhaps the most famous queen, in Jewish history is Queen Esther, consort to a King of Persia and a great heroine to her people. Her story is, or at least should be, well known to all Jews and Christians (if they read their Old Testament). As with almost anyone from Biblical times, there are a great many details about Queen Esther than remain a mystery, however, the important points are clearly recorded. She was born with the name Hadassah, we know not when or where. Her story begins with that of the man who would be her husband, there being some debate as to his identity. The Bible identifies him as Assuerus, “who reigned from India to Ethiopia over a hundred twenty-seven provinces” with the city of Susan as his capital. So, a big shot in Persian history without question. Traditionally it was thought this referred to King Xerxes I of the Achaemenid empire but more recent scholars have theorized it to have been a king of the later Sassanid empire.

In an effort to show off his greatness, King Assuerus held the party to top all parties, inviting all his regional governors and all the great men of Persia to party hardy for nearly 200 days. Of course, no such display could be complete without showing off your smoking hot trophy wife so King Assuerus, after getting gloriously drunk, called for his queen, Vasthi, but she refused to come. Somewhat astounded, the King was warned by his advisors that such defiance might provoke a wave of feminism which would leave all the great men of Persia frustrated and sleeping on their sofas. So, Queen Vasthi is given the boot and King Assuerus starts the hunt for a new royal consort. Every province was to send their most beautiful virgins for his inspection, with each undergoing a full year of preparation to make them suitable choices for the ruler of most of the known world at the time. After making his inspection, King Assuerus chose a famously beautiful Jewish girl named Esther, previously known as Hadassah. It is said that she was an orphan who had been raised by her cousin, a man named Mordecai. Hailing from the tribe of Benjamin she had stayed with her cousin, who was more like her father for all intents and purposes, even after Cyrus had allowed the Jews to return home to Jerusalem.

Queen Esther was presumably chosen for her loveliness but quickly proved her loyalty as well thanks to Mordecai who overheard two guards plotting to assassinate the King. He told Esther who told the King who had the men put to death. However, it was also Mordecai who would be the inadvertent instigator of the troubles to come. When he refused to bow down before a favorite prince of King Assuerus the prince, Aman, decided to take his revenge on all the Jews in the Persian Empire. He charged the Jews with spreading sedition against the King and obtained his approval on an order for their total annihilation. Mordecai went into mourning over this plan of genocide and tried to get Queen Esther to intervene with the King, pointing out that she would likely be killed too if the order was carried out. However, the Queen had to stay in the harem with the lesser concubines and could only go to the King if he called for her to attend to him. To do otherwise would see her killed instantly.

To add to her worry, the King had not called for her attention in about a month so she had no expectation that a summons would come in time. She had everyone in her own household and all her fellow Jews in Persia pray and fast for three days before Esther finally determined she could wait no longer and bravely decided to go on her own to see the King -summons or no summons. Thankfully, King Assuerus was not unhappy with her at all and when she appeared before him was exceedingly glad to see her. Once again enthralled by her, the King promised to grant her any request, even should she ask for half his empire, he would hand it over instantly. Showing she had brains to match her beauty and bravery, Queen Esther instantly formulated a plan and asked for a banquet to be attended by herself, the King and Prince Aman. It was done and during the banquet, when the king was compliant and feeling no pain, she asked him to hold another the next day. The King did so even while the gallows were being prepared to hang poor Mordecai.

Esther and the King in Italian Renaissance style

Such high living caused King Assuerus to have some trouble sleeping and he ordered someone to read to him some of the recent headlines from ‘The Persian Chronicle’ in the course of which he was reminded of how Mordecai had saved his life. He asked his servants how he had rewarded the man for this good deed only to be told he had not rewarded him at all. Well, the King couldn’t have that; it just made him look plain rude and ungrateful. So, he began to wonder what he could do to reward so valuable a subject. The next morning when Prince Aman arrived to get the go-ahead to hang Mordecai the King asked him, “What ought to be done to the man whom the king is desirous to honor?” Being a very self-centered sort to say the least, Prince Aman assumed the King was referring to him, quickly said that such a man should be dressed in kingly robes, put on the King’s own horse, have a crown put on his head and have all the princes and nobles hold his horse and sing his praises. One can imagine the shock when the King said, ‘Great idea! Go do that to Mordecai the Jew who sits outside the palace gate!’

Prince Aman was positively mortified and ran home to his wife, crying and wailing only to have her tell him he better suck it up and make nice with the Jew before the King gets angry. Just then the king’s eunuchs arrived to summon the prince to Queen Esther’s second banquet. He attended and the King asked Queen Esther again what he could do to show her his appreciation. Finally Esther said that Prince Aman was planning to massacre all of her people at which point the King stormed out in a fury and Prince Aman started doing some really fast talking to make nice with Queen Esther so that she might persuade the King to not tear him into little pieces when he came back. Yeah, probably not a good idea considering that Queen Esther was laying on her bed at the time and when the King came back he found Prince Aman all flushed and in a nervous sweat on the bed with his wife. “Fury” probably doesn’t begin to describe it. Immediately he had Prince Aman taken out and hanged on the same rope the prince had planned for Mordecai to set off his little genocide.

Esther portrayed in the film "One Night With the King"

The disaster was averted and to show his gratitude King Assuerus gave Aman’s palace to Queen Esther. She told the King that Mordecai was her “uncle” and the King gave him the prince’s ring. Queen Esther also put Mordecai in charge of her new palace, which beats sitting outside the gates all day. Queen Esther then fell before the King and begged him to call off the genocide against the Jews. Until that banquet Assuerus had not known his queen was a Jew at all. Naturally, he called off the genocide, discounting the late Aman’s claims of sedition and even went a step further by sending out orders throughout his empire that all the Jews were to be given permission to take their revenge on those who had planned to do them harm, to basically wipe them out and take their stuff. They snuffed out those who had been prepared to kill them but didn’t go on quite the rampage the King had authorized and didn’t take any loot from them. Nonetheless, the Jews in the Persian empire declared the occasion a new holiday for their people when they were saved from death thanks to the intervention of good Queen Esther, the orphan who became a queen who risked death to save her people from genocide. Certainly, queens do not come any better than that.

Today in History

The Mad Monarchist remembers the birth, today in 1919, of His Imperial Majesty Mohammad Reza Pahlavi, last Shahanshah (King of Kings) and Aryamehr (Light of the Aryans) of Iran, the last legitimate ruler of that proud and ancient country. May we soon see the day when the rotten republic collapses and the legitimate monarchy is restored to the lands of ancient Persia.

MM Video: The Imperial Family of Iran

Did the Shah Predict Our Current Crisis?

Consort Profile: Queen Roxane

Queen Roxane, wife and royal consort to a monarch who managed to conquer virtually the entire world as he knew it, might be thought to have lived a very full and lavish life. However, Roxane, wife of none other than Alexander the Great, actually had a pretty rough time of it. No one can say when exactly she was born, only that it was sometime before the year 343 BC. She was the daughter of King Oxyartes of Bactria, an area located in what is now Afghanistan. Her name, also rendered as Roxana, came from a Persian term meaning “Little Star”. The Bactrian court secluded itself in the fortress of Sogdian Rock, an imposing defensive position surrounded by a seemingly insurmountable sheer cliff. When word came that the forces of Alexander the Great, which had conquered Greece and the Middle East, the King of Bactria remained confident that, come what may, no force on earth could ever reach his rocky retreat. He had, of course, underestimated his opponent.

In 327 BC the Macedonian king approached Sogdian Rock and determined that he would, yet again, accomplish the impossible. He picked 300 of his most agile and athletic climbers from the ranks of his army and sent them to scale the cliff in the middle of the night. A stunned King Oxyartes woke the next morning to find the soldiers in his palace and bringing him breakfast! The king was so shocked and crestfallen that his impenetrable fortress had been breached that he surrendered to Alexander immediately and without a struggle. Moreover, he also offered the hand of his daughter Roxane in marriage to Alexander the Great. According to Plutarch the meeting of Alexander and Roxane was love at first sight, though today doubt has been cast on this idea in preference for the narrative that Alexander, at that point, was already infatuated with his right-hand-man Hephaestion.

Whether Hephaestion was simply good friend or ‘long time companion’ can be debated but he stood by Alexander when he and Roxane were married. The marriage was done in the local Bactrian custom as Alexander was always careful to insinuate himself into the local culture rather than imposing a totally new one on conquered peoples. He later married Stateira, daughter of King Darius III of Persia for the same reason. However, the contemporary accounts state that Alexander and Roxane were devoted to each other and she was certainly devoted to him. She even accompanied him on his final campaign to conquer India; a land beyond the frontiers most knew at that time, shrouded in mystery and greatly feared. In the end, India proved to be the one campaign the unbeatable Alexander could not win and Roxane suffered alongside him as he left the subcontinent in defeat. However, things became even worse when Hephaestion died in 324 BC.

After this tragedy Alexander was continuously depressed and never seemed quite the same man that he had been before. It was thus, perhaps, not so great a shock that only a few months later Alexander himself died in Babylon, leaving Roxane a widow and pregnant with his child. A son was born to Queen Roxane and named Alexander IV Aegus. Because her son was a potential heir and successor to the world empire built by Alexander the Great, mother and son became the primary targets of a number of intrigues and plots. Given the ruthless methods used against her, Roxane was forced to be equally ruthless in order to survive and she managed the murder of Alexander’s other wife Stateira. Roxane felt she had finally gained a measure of security when she was supported and protected by her mother-in-law Olympias. However, Cassander, formerly one of Alexander’s generals, moved against Olympias, defeated her and executed her. Hoping to claim power for himself he could not allow Roxane and her son to remain. In about 309 BC Queen Roxane and her 12-year-old son were both killed by Cassander, wiping out the seed of Alexander the Great forever.

Passing of the Shah

The Radical Royalist marks the passing of Iran's last great ruler before the fundamentalist "Islamic Republic" takeover. His Majesty Mohammed Reza Pahlavi, King of kings and Light of the Aryans, came to the throne in a time of great uncertainty but led his country to its peak of prestige, power and prosperity and done while keeping peaceful relations with the major powers of the world. His overthrow was a disaster of the first order and marked the first time that terrorists of the stripe we have come to know too well were able to take control of an entire country. Iranian society was never so free and open as when he was on the throne and if he could at times be harsh we can see only too clearly today exactly why the enemies he was dealing with were worthy of such treatment. May he rest in peace and may his memory be one day vindicated.

Free Iran!

MM Video: Iran - The Time is Now

The Problems in Iran

Everyone is talking about Iran right now and a few precious souls are predicting that the power of the Ayatollah might be shaken and regime change could be on the way to the Islamic Republic. Hope springs eternal I guess. The problem, as I see it, is that not only are there relatively few major differences between the two feuding claimants to the presidency; that presidency holds only nominal power anyway and I don't see the "change" crowd advocating the right kind of change. Where are the brave soulds standing up to defend the monarchy of the late Shah? They are out there of course but are given virtually zero face time by the mainstream media. Everyone is talking about the smell of revolution being in the air but what should be talked about is how all of this proves what a disastrous mistake the Islamic revolution was and illustrates the need for a good ol'fashioned counterrevolution.

The son of the late Shah has long been working for "regime change" in Iran though unfortunately he has stopped short of advocating restoration of the monarchy. He has been beating the democracy drum for a while and when pressed on the issue of the monarchy inevitably claims humbly that he would be willing to serve in whatever capacity the Iranian people choose for him once they have a true democracy in Iran. I have the utmost respect for the Crown Prince and at this point almost any change in Iran would bound to be an improvement. However, my fear is that, even if democracy takes root, it will not lead to the restoration of the monarchy and we will see the Islamic revolution portrayed in official histories in the same way that the French Revolution is today.

Consider how often you have read or heard about the French Revolution and the horrific bloodbath that followed. Almost without exception the liberal elites will half-heartedly confess that the Reign of Terror was "unfortunate" but that it was a necessary evil to destroy the monarchy of the ancien regime that is, to them, the ultimate bogey man. My fear for Iran is that, if there is regime change and by some wildly implausible series of events Iran becomes an actual democracy their own revolution will be glossed over in this way as well. Liberal elites will shrug off the horrors and crimes of the theocratic republicans and say that the Islamic Revolution was a sad but essential step in getting rid of the autocratic monarchy to continue down the path to a secular, democratic republic. If anything the people should look at Iran, wake up, and realize that republicanism is not a guarantee of prosperity and democracy is a fickle and fragile thing that can be easily manipulated, suppressed or steered in a chosen direction. All that has happened in Iran in the last few decades should prove that republicanism is a failure and that the Shah had been right all along. His son should be restored asap with the mullah's sincerest apologies. Sounds unreasonable I know, but I am...The Mad Monarchist.

Royal Guardians Profile: The Immortals

The Iranian Imperial Guard was formed in 1942 as an outgrowth of the former Persian Royal Guard. It started with 700 special volunteers organized by General Jafar Shafaghat but quickly expanded in size to the Imperial Guard Division in 1953. It was built around the Javidan Guard who were known as "The Immortals" in reference to the famous Imperial Guard of ancient Persia from which they historically descended. It has always been somewhat unique in Imperial Iran that, although they have long been a staunchly Shia Islamic country on the whole, they still took great pride in their history and the glories of the ancient Persian Empire. The Immortals were housed at the Lavizan Barracks in the north side of Tehran and by 1978 this most elite formation had grown to brigade-size and included its own tank arm as well as a troop of household cavalry (Pahlavi Cavalry Guard) for ceremonial duties at the court of the Shah. Despite this growth however, standards for membership were kept extremely high. To qualify to become an Immortal a recruit had to pass an astounding array of mental and physical tests as well as be able to recite his own family history backwards to 23 generations from memory.

The Immortals were a stylish symbol of what would prove to be the last bow of Persian royal glory before the outbreak of the Islamic Revolution. In that most crucial period the Iranian Imperial Guard proved staunchly loyal to the Shah. There were some clashes with militant revolutionaries but everything happened too quickly for a major battle to ensue. The Shah left the country on the promise that he could return after the situation had been calmed, but of course that never happened. The Ayatollah took power, abolished the monarchy and declared the country a theocracy as the Islamic Republic of Iran. The Iranian Imperial Guard was returned to its barracks and disbanded, some later being absorbed into regular military units to participate in the Iraq-Iran War.