Upcoming Episodes!

Episode 502: "Meet the Pahlavis" (coming October 14!) As we discuss the events of 1920 to 1953, we see Reza Pahlavi become the Shah of Iran as Reza Shah, establishing the Pahlavi dynasty. With the United Kingdom and Soviet Union still eying his country greedily, Reza Shah rules until 1941, when his pro-German sympathies during World War II play a role in his ouster. His successor is his weak-willed teenaged son Mohammed Reza Pahlavi, who assumes the throne as Mohammed Reza Shah. The new shah seeks to curry favor with the United States as a counterweight to the British and Soviets. His success is limited at first, but America's rising fear of communism during the early Cold War cements Iran as a bulwark against communism in American strategic thinking. 

Episode 503: "Persepolis" (coming October 28!) After Iran's popular, democratically elected prime minister, Mohammad Mosaddegh, nationalizes Iran's oil industry, the United Kingdom embargoes the country in retaliation. At first the United States tries to play the role of mediator, but when Eisenhower becomes president, the U.S. stance shifts to one of anti-Communism above all. Fearing that increasing economic hardship in Iran will lead Mossadegh to align with Iran's Communist Tudeh Party and that this in turn willl lead to a Soviet takeover of Iran, the CIA and British intelligence agencies cooperate to stage a coup against Mossadegh, snuffing out Iran's budding democracy and creating a absolute monarchy under the Shah. What follows between 1953 and 1973 are the Shah's glory days, in which the U.S. view of his pivotal role as a bulwark against communism leads to his close association with U.S. presidents, U.S. arms sales to his regime, and the Shah's "White Revolution" of internal social and economic reforms intended to head off the appeal of communism in Iran. In 1971, the Shah throws the most expensive party in world history at Persepolis to celebrate the 2,500-year anniversary of the Persian Empire, intending to glorify Iran, its wealth, its modernization, and his own regime, but instead cementing his image as an out-of-touch autocrat obsessed with Western culture at the expense of his own. Through it all, no one is paying attention to the impact any of this is having on Iranian society, and the 1973 oil shock the Shah helps to engineer during the Yom Kippur War will set in motion the events leading to his downfall six years later.

Episode 504: "Revolution" (coming November 11!) With his windfall from the 1973 oil shock, the Shah becomes even more repressive at home as his Westernization policies alienate more and more of his subjects. The American foreign policy establishment remains resolutely focused on Iran's role as a bulwark against Soviet expansion -- so much so that it barely notices the trouble the Shah's regime is in. Finally, the Shah falls in 1979, a complete surprise to American strategists, who suddenly find America's entire position in the Middle East completely changed. The Carter administration gives refuge to the deposed Shah, the personnel at the U.S. Embassy in Tehran are taken hostage, and a failed U.S. rescue attempt in 1980 cements Ayatollah Khomeini as the leader of the new Islamic Republic of Iran, a regime deeply hostile to the United States.

Episode 505 "Aftermath" (coming November 25!) Since 1980, the United States has faced a regime in Iran that it despises -- and that many of Iran's own people despise as well. Yet many U.S. attitudes and actions since 1980 have helped to keep that regime in power right up to the present day. In this concluding episode of the series, we explore the 47-year standoff between the United States and the Islamic Republic of Iran -- and its prospects for the future.