Carter’s Quandary

Bayandor, Darioush

doi:10.1007/978-3-319-96119-4_14

Darioush Bayandor²

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Abstract

Ambassador Sullivan was able to anticipate the fall of the Shah and speculate on a faith-based new regime. In a last-ditch effort, Carter asked the Shah to shed his human rights scruples and act decisively to restore order. The Shah’s negative reaction prompted an Iran policy review and inter-allied consultations that culminated in the Guadeloupe Summit in early January. Meanwhile Sullivan, in league with Secretary Vance, embarked on a scheme for accelerated regime change. Archive records presented provide evidence of unsuspected manipulations by the ambassador that bordered on perfidy. He and the State Department had misjudged the nature and the dynamics of the opposition forces in Iran, which yielded a different set of outcomes. In a distorted narrative in his 1981 memoirs, Sullivan tried to cover up his errors.

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Notes

1.
Sullivan to Vance, 10445, October 27, 1978, DSWL; Brzezinski, Power and Principle, 355; Sick, All Fall Down, 59.
2.
For Vance’s leanings towards the Sullivan–Precht line, see Vance, Hard, 327–30; Bill, The Eagle and Lion, 251–3.
3.
Vance, Power and Principle: 355.
4.
Brzezinski, Power and Principle, 355.
5.
White House Diary, 261.
6.
Sullivan to Vance (“For Your Eyes Only”), 11039, November 9, 1978, DSWL.
7.
Ibid., para. 10.
8.
Ibid., para. 8.
9.
Ibid., para. 9.E.
10.
Sullivan to DOS, 10883, November 7, 1978, DNSA.
11.
Nicholas Gage, “U.S. Envoy in Iran”, New York Times, November 13, 1978.
12.
Sullivan, Mission to, 203–4; Sick, All Fall Down, 87.
13.
Carter famously sent a handwritten note addressed to “Cy, Zbig and Stan” (Vance, Brzezinski and Turner) on November 11, carping about the quality of political intelligence. William Safire, The New York Times, November 23, 1978.
14.
Sick, All Fall Down, 88; Sullivan, Mission to Iran, 193–4.
15.
Blumenthal audience with the Shah, cables 11409, and [Kuwait] 06240, both dated November 21, 1978, DSWL.
16.
Carter, White House Diary, 261, entries for November 20–21, 1978.
17.
Personal information of the author, confirmed by Sullivan in his memoirs; see Mission to Iran, 171–2. See also, Brzezinski, Power and Principle, 369–70.
18.
Christopher to Sullivan, 295164, November 22, 1978, DSWL.
19.
Ibid., para. 3.
20.
Ibid., para. 2.
21.
Ibid., para. 5.
22.
Ibid., para. 6.
23.
Bernard Gwertzman, New York Times, November 20, 1978; Sick, All Fall Down, 95; “Iran, the Making of US Foreign Policy (1977–1980),” November 19, 1978, DNSA.
24.
Sullivan to Christopher, 11514, November 24, 1978, DSWL.
25.
Ibid.
26.
Brzezinski, Power and Principle, 368.
27.
Vance, Hard Choices, 330; Sick, All Fall Down, 103; Brzezinski, Power and Principle, 370.
28.
Sullivan, Mission to Iran, 220–1.
29.
“The Diem Coup after 50 Years”, NSA Electronic Briefing Book No. 444.
30.
Brzezinski, Power and Principle, 370; Vance, Hard Choices, 30.
31.
Vance, Hard Choices, 330.
32.
George Ball memoirs in Guerrero, The Carter Administration, 147; Brzezinski, Power and Principle, 355.
33.
The meeting took place on December 12, 1978, following a television panel discussion broadcast by the Public Broadcasting Service (PBS).
34.
Foreign Affairs Oral History interview with Charles Naas, 2008, p. 6.
35.
Vivian R. Gruder, The Notables and the Nation: The Political Schooling of the French, 1787–1788. Harvard University Press, 2008.
36.
George Ball memoirs, Past Has Another Pattern, 459–60, in Guerrero, The Carter Administration, 147–8; Bill, The Eagle and Lion, 252–3; Sick, All Fall Down, 104, 107–8; Buchan, Days of God, 197; Rubin, Paved with Good Intentions, 235–6.
37.
George Ball memoirs, Past Has Another Pattern: 459–60, in Guerrero, The Carter Administration 147–8.
38.
For Sullivan’s negative reaction to the idea of the Council of Notables, see Sick, All Fall Down, 109; for his involvement in identifying candidates, see Sullivan, Mission to Iran, 221.
39.
Rubin, Paved with Good Intentions, 236; Bill, The Eagle and Lion, 253; Guerrero, The Carter Administration, 148.
40.
Vance, Hard Choices, 330.
41.
Vance, Hard Choices, 330; Guerrero, The Carter Administration 148–9; Sick, All Fall Down, 115.
42.
US Embassy in Jidda to DOS, 08490, December 4, 1978.
43.
Sick, All Fall Down, 116; Vance, Hard Choices, 331; Guerrero, The Carter Administration 148–9.
44.
George Ball, cited in Guerrero, The Carter Administration, 148.
45.
Department of State to US embassies in London, Bonn, Paris, Tokyo, 316755, December 16, 1978, DSWL.
46.
Cited in Browne Inquest, DNSA 59.
47.
US Embassy, London, to DOS, LONDON, 21261, December 29, 1978, DSWL.
48.
Browne Inquest, DNSA 60.
49.
See “Giscard’s Dilemma” in Chap. 11.
50.
Giscard d’Estaing, Le Pouvoir et la Vie, 1–108.
51.
The opposition had not remained idle. Sadeq Ghotbzadeh prepared a brief cleared by Khomeini for the Guadeloupe Summit, according to Yazdi’s memoirs, 3.658–60.
52.
Poniatowski’s 2,500-word report to President Giscard d’Estaing is reproduced in full as an appendix to volume 1 of the latter’s memoirs, Giscard d’Estaing, Le Pouvoir et la Vie, 386–8.
53.
Ibid.
54.
The New York Times, January 3, 1979.
55.
Stoessel to DOS, BONN23003, December 18, 1978, DSWL.
56.
Ibid.
57.
Yazdi memoirs, 3.659–60.
58.
Vance, Hard Choices, 331.
59.
Henry Precht Memorandum addressed to Assistant-Secretary of State Saunders, Iran: Making of US Foreign Policy (1977–1980), December 19, 1978, DNSA.
60.
Sullivan to DOS, cable 11758, November 30, 1978, DSWL.
61.
Parsons to FCO, telegram 938, December 7, 1978, PREM. 16/1720.
62.
Sullivan to DOS, 11039, November 9, 1978, DSWL.
63.
Sick, All Fall Down, 133; General Robert E. Huyser, Mission to Tehran (New York: Harper and Row Publishers, 1986), 73, 123.
64.
Slightly paraphrased in, Sullivan to DOS, 12592, December 26, 1978, DSWL.
65.
Sullivan to DOS, 12676, December 28, 1978, DSWL.
66.
Sick, All Fall Down, 126; Vance, Hard Choices, 332.
67.
Ibid.
68.
Sick, All Fall Down, 125–6; Brzezinski, Power and Principle, 375; Vance, Hard Choices, 332–3.
69.
Vance to Sullivan, cable 282348, December 28, 1978; DSWL; Sick, All Fall Down, 126; Brzezinski, Power and Principle, 375.
70.
Sick, All Fall Down, 126. (The report of this audience could not be found among the latest tranche of declassified State Department files, but there are other independent references to this audience elsewhere.)
71.
Sick, All Fall Down, 127; Sullivan, Mission to Iran, 230–1 (the confusion over the sequence of events in Sullivan’s narrative is important to note).
72.
White House Diary, 268.
73.
Ibid, 268.
74.
Brzezinski, Power and Principle, 375.
75.
Ibid., 371, p. 376. (Brzezinski reproduced his diary notes from his discussion with Carter and with other principals on January 3.)
76.
Sullivan to DOS, cable 12735, December 29, 1979, DSWL; for his depiction of Bakhtiar as a ‘fig leaf’, see Mission to Iran, 235.
77.
Sullivan, Mission to Iran, 221.
78.
Ibid., 236.
79.
Sullivan, Mission to Iran, 212, 214–6, 233; for precise steps in this direction, see the section ‘Sullivan: A Redux’, in Chap. 16, infra.
80.
Vance, Hard Choices, 336–7.
81.
Sullivan to DOS, 00065, January 2, 1979, DSWL.
82.
Ibid.
83.
The Shah’s medical report cited in Queen Farah, An Enduring Love, 294–5.
84.
Sullivan to DOS, 00561, January 11, 1979, DSWL (reporting his conversation that day).
85.
Pahlavi, Réponse à l’histoire, 246.
86.
Sullivan, eyes only, for Vance, 00088, January 3, 1979, DSWL; Vance, Hard Choices, 334–5.
87.
Sullivan to Vance, 0088, January 3, 1979.
88.
Ibid.
89.
Ibid.
90.
DOS to Sullivan, 1979STATE000120, January 2, 1979, DSWL.
91.
Agheli, Roozshomar, 2–384, entry for December 30, 1978.
92.
Brzezinski, notes from the discussion of the SCC and NSC meetings, January 3, 1979, in Power and Principle, 376–7; Vance, Hard Choices, 335 (note that Vance mistakenly gives the date of the SCC NSC meeting as January 4).
93.
Carter, White House Diary, 272, entry for January 3, 1979; Brzezinski notes Carter’s annoyance, Power and Principle, 378.
94.
Brzezinski, Power and Principle, 376.
95.
Vance, Hard Choices, 335; Sick, All Fall Down, 131; Brzezinski, Power and Principle, 377.
96.
Vance to Sullivan, 1979STATE001511, January 4, 1979 DSWL.
97.
Brzezinski, Power and Principle, 377; the same narrative with small variations is given by Vance, Hard Choices, 335, and by Sick, All Fall Down, 131–2.
98.
Sullivan, Mission to Iran, 230.
99.
The New York Times, December 29, 1978.
100.
Meetings were held at Hamak Hotel in St François County on the eastern-most side of the Grande Terre part of Guadeloupe.
101.
Briefing circular to US embassies in allied countries, 1979STATE005365, January 9, 1979, DSWL.
102.
Carter, White House Diary, 275, entry for January 6; also in Jimmy Carter, Keeping Faith, Memoirs of a President (Fayetteville: University of Arkansas Press, 1995), 445.
103.
Giscard’s account of the discussion of Iran at Guadeloupe is given in two different volumes of his memoirs, Le Pouvoir et la Vie, vol. 1, pp. 109ff and vol. 2, pp. 373–34.
104.
Giscard d’Estaing, Le Pouvoir et la Vie, 1.110–1 and 2.373–4.
105.
Giscard, Le Pouvoir et la Vie, 1.110 and 2.373.
106.
Carter, White House Diary, 275, entry for January 6.
107.
Rosalynn Carter’s memoirs in Shawcross, The Shah’s Last Ride, 133fn1.

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Darioush Bayandor

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Bayandor, D. (2019). Carter’s Quandary. In: The Shah, the Islamic Revolution and the United States. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-96119-4_14

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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-96119-4_14
Published: 03 December 2018
Publisher Name: Palgrave Macmillan, Cham
Print ISBN: 978-3-319-96118-7
Online ISBN: 978-3-319-96119-4
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