IRAN: EXPORTING THE REVOLUTION

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP81B00401R000500100001-8
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: S
• Document Page Count: 16
• Document Creation Date: December 20, 2016
• Document Release Date: April 27, 2006
• Sequence Number: 1
• Publication Date: March 1, 1980
• Content Type: REPORT

Foreign
Assessment
Center
Iran:
Exporting the Revolution
Secret
PA 80-10121
March 1980
7
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 National Secret
Foreign
Assessment
Center
Iran:
Exporting the Revolution
An Intelligence Assessment
Research for this report was completed
on 10 March 1980.
This assessment was prepared b
Iran Task Force. Comments and queries are we come
and should be directed to the Chief, Iran Task
Force, on
This paper has been coordinated with the Office of
Strategic Research and the National Intelligence
Officer for Near East and South Asi 1
Secret
PA 80-10121
March 1980
Approved For Release 2006/04/27: CIA-RDP81 B00401 R000500100001-8
 Approved For Release 2006/04/27: CIA-RDP81 B00401 R0005001OOO61$
Iran:
Exporting the RevolutiorEl
Key Judgments Iranian leaders, including Ayatollah Khomeini and President Bani-Sadr,
are ideologically committed to aiding other Islamic revolutionaries. The
Iranians see their revolution as an example for other "oppressed" peoples
and believe that the organizational and ideological techniques they
developed to topple the Shah can be used by others.
Tehran's efforts to export its revolution have been complicated b
the
y
confusion that has marked all facets of Iranian politics since the fall of the
Shah. Iranian leaders and groups often have acted independently of the
government and have embarrassed the Foreign Ministry's efforts to
maintain correct relations with Iran's neighbors.
If Iran's internal problems ease in the next year, Tehran probably will step
up efforts to destabilize its neighbors. Bani-Sadr appears to be taking steps
to increase support for unrest in Iraq and Afghanistan. Iranian support to
Afghan insurgents could give the Soviets an excuse to intervene in Iran.
Iran's efforts to export its revolution are a threat to key US interests. US
allies in the area would have reason to be nervous if the Iranians were to play
a more active role. Iranian-supported unrest could lead to sabotage and
strikes by oil workers, since Shias inhabit many of the oil-producing areas of
the Persian Gulf states.
iii Secret
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Secret
Iran:
Exporting the Revolution
One year after the fall of the Shah, Iran's leaders
appear more determined than ever to export their
Islamic revolution to other countries in the Near East
and South Asia. Although internal problems continue
to limit Iran's ability to export the revolution, Tehran
radio broadcasts a steady stream of propaganda every
day to Iran's neighbors. The country's leaders-
including Ayatollah Khomeini and President Bani-
Sadr-often express their commitment to the liber-
ation of oppressed peoples throughout the Muslim
world. Khomeini, for example, said on 20 February:
I hope that (Iran) will become a modelfor all the
meek and Muslim nations in the world and that
this century will become the century for smash-
ing great idols ... 0 meek of the world, rise and
rescue yourselves from the talons of nefarious
oppressors; 0 zealous Muslims in various coun-
tries of the world, wake from your sleep of
neglect and liberate Islam and the Islamic
countries from the clutches of the colonialists
and those subservient to them.
Our revolution will not win unless it is exported.
We are going to create a new order in which
deprived people will not always be deprived. As
long as our brothers in Palestine, Afghanistan,
the Philippines, and all over the world have not
been liberated, we Iranians will not put down our
arms. We give our hand to deprived people all
over the world.
Iran's revolutionary rhetoric and its actions in the
last year have greatly alarmed its neighbors. The
Arab states of the Persian Gulf region have been the
most visibly disturbed. Iraq has initiated a program
of aid to dissidents inside Iran in order to weaken
the Khomeini regime and prevent it from actively
subverting Iraq's majority Shia M'alim, population.
The leaders of Iran have consistently believed that
their revolution should be a model for other
countries in the region. Former Foreign Minister
Yazdi commented right after the fall of the Shah's
government in February 1979 that the monarchy's
collapse signaled a "new era of Islamic struggle
triggered by our revolution.'
--Khomeini, Bani-Sadr, Yazdi, and other Iranian lead-
ers believe that their revolution was a triumph of
Islamic values over the decadence of a corrupt,
repressive, Westernized regime. They stress that the
revolution was based on Islamic idealism-a spiritual
awakening-which in turn led to the polarization of
society between the enlightened masses and the
corrupt elite. As a result Tehran's revolutionary
lessons are not exclusively Iranian but common to all
Muslim countries and even all Third World countries.
Iran's leaders argue-with some justice-that their
revolution is unique in the modern history of the
Middle East. Rather than seizing power through a
military coup, they achieved their goal through the
mass mobilization of society. Their people are first
reminded of the virtues of Islam, which alienates them
from their corrupt rulers. Armed with faith in Allah
and the justice of their cause, this argument goes on,
the people as a whole are ready to confront the regime.
I 25X6
The revolutionary leadership believes that if Iran fails
to export its revolution, the country will be isolated in
an unfriendly environment of hostile regimes. Most of
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PLO chief Yasser Arafat, Ayatollah Khomeini's son Ahmad, and
President Bani-Sadr expressing solidarity with the world's "op-
pressed" at the celebrations marking the first anniversary of the
Iranian revolution.
25X6
these leaders are preoccupied with the example of
Prime Minister Mossadegh's government in 1953,
which, they believe fell because it lacked allies against
the United States and the United Kingdom. The
survival of the Islamic Republic is closely tied, in this
view, to the overthrow of pro-Western regimes in the
Middle East
25X6
Moreover, many Iranian leaders spent years in exile as
leaders of the anti-Shah opposition during which they
developed close ties with a broad range of Middle
Eastern radical movements. Khomeini, for example,
was one of the earliest supporters of Yasir Arafat's
Fatah movement, and Bani-Sadr has long had close
ties with the radical Lebanese Shia movement for-
merly led by Imam Musa Sadr. The Iranians clearly
feel obligated to support their fellow revolutionaries.
Most Iranian leaders, including Khomeini and Bani-
Sadr, have been careful to say in public that Tehran
has no intention of interfering in the internal affairs of
its neighbors and that since a revolution is primarily a
spiritual awakening, it must begin in the hearts and
minds of the oppressed. As such it cannot be simply
exported by Iran, and no quantity of external aid can
act as a substitute for the mobilization of each nation's
own internal forces. Nonetheless, the Iranians believe
that they can teach other Islamic peoples the necessary
revolutionary techniques and organizational theory.
Iran so far has provided mostly rhetoric and propa-
ganda to other revolutionaries, safe haven for foreign
dissidents, and a meeting place for radicals. In part,
this reflects the ideological basis of their world view. It
also reflects, however, the weakness of the central
government in Tehran which has been preoccupied
with consolidating its power and lacks the means to
more actively export revolution.
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Secret
Shia Muslim Population as Percentage of Total Population
`'~'6
United Arab
Saudi Arabia Emirates
2 Eastern
Province
South
North Yemen
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boundary representati a it
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