____________________________________________ 12 IICC Perspectives It is not inconceivable that a people like this, with such a past, may one day find the right moment to rise up against its rulers and overthrow the regime of the mullahs. With all the above, various interest groups within Iranian society have managed to unite and revolt four times against the rule of the Shah’s dynasty. There was the Tobacco Revolt of 1890, which annulled an exploitative colonial contract with the British; the Constitutional Revolution at the beginning of the 20th century, which led to the establishment of a parliament; the Mossadegh revolt in 1953, which led to the Shah’s temporary removal until his return with the help of the CIA and MI6; and the popular uprising in 1978, which gave birth to the revolution that led to the establishment of the Islamic Republic. It is not inconceivable that a people like this, with such a past, may one day find the right moment to rise up against its rulers and overthrow the regime of the mullahs. In conclusion, two anecdotes: The first: an Iranian folk tale I heard upon landing at Mehrabad Airport from the man who greeted me on my first arrival in Iran in 1968: If you see a Persian drowning in a river and say to him, “Give me your hand and I will save you,” he would prefer to drown rather than give you something for free. But if you say to him, “Take my hand and I will save you,” he will quickly reach out and be saved. And the second: Sir Denis Wright, the British ambassador to Tehran in the early 1960s, wrote in his end-of-service report that the Iranians are a people who say the opposite of what they think and do the opposite of what they say, but that does not mean that their actions do not correspond to what they think. A defense pact cannot be signed with them because, simply put, they are neither trustworthy nor suitable for such a relationship.
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