"The Nation Is Victorious"

Inside the grim, guarded barracks of the Teheran 2nd Armored Division ten shabby prisoners ate a dinner of stew and rice. They were the first to be convicted among 612 Tudeh plotters arrested, last September for planning a Communist revolution. Now they sat under sentence of death. Yet they seemed optimistic: this was Iran after all. where the ins do not ordinarily kill the outs--on the theory that the roles might some day be reversed. The ten had appealed their death sentences, and looked to the young Shah for reprieve.

A few hours later that night, Brigadier General Hussein Azemudeh, the thin-lipped military prosecutor, drove up to the barracks and sent for the prisoners. Two months ago nine of the ten prisoners had been splendidly uniformed brother officers of his. Now, in shapeless prison garb, heads shaven, stubbly faces pale, they shuffled in. The general glared at the first man, and said harshly: "You are called here to make your will. Know what I mean?" Colonel Siamak cleared his throat. "Yes," he said, "I know." The appeal had failed.

Last Request. Colonel Siamak took a pen and with trembling hands wrote his last words. A mullah offered him the Koran. Siamak waved it aside: "I don't believe in God and that sort of thing." To each of the others in turn, the mullah extended the Koran. Pray and be sent to Paradise, he begged. "Paradise was the place we were going to make in this country," said one, stonily. "We know no other paradise." But three among the ten accepted the mullah's offer. Then the condemned men made one last request: to be left alone, unwatched by guards, a few minutes together. The general nodded, and they were led off to a room from which soon came the sound of songs and cheers--Communist songs and cheers to nerve each other.

At dawn two army ambulances drove onto the regimental firing range, and the ten men, their hands bound, stepped out on trembling feet, looked across the bare, floodlit ground and saw ten wooden posts newly erected before a high mud wall. Guards tied each man to his post. "Don't hurt me," said Major Atarod. "I'll be quiet now." "What do you mean, brother?" smiled Colonel Siamak. "It's finished." He turned to the guards tying him to his post and said: "If we had succeeded, we'd have been less tactful with you." He at least accepted the fact that he and his companions were not ordinary politicians, entitled to generosity, but soldiers who had betrayed their uniforms.

First Ten. The condemned men refused white handkerchiefs, but the guards blindfolded them anyway, then stepped aside. Now the prisoners faced their executioners: 20 soldiers with automatic rifles, two soldiers--one kneeling and one standing--to each prisoner. One of the blindfolded Communists cried: "The nation is victorious." Once, that Tudeh slogan had electrified Teheran's streets, driven the young Shah into hasty exile and almost captured all Iran. But last week it bounced off a muddy wall and died. From others of the prisoners came the cries: "Death to imperialism! Long live Iran's proletariat!" Then the duty officer's arm went up, and one ragged volley smashed into the bound men, then another. The firing cut some of the ropes and bodies toppled to the ground. A sergeant unholstered his pistol and ran forward, to give the coup de grace. A sigh bubbled out of young Captain Shafa: "Kill me, I am not dead yet." The sergeant obliged.

Another twelve plotters have also been sentenced to die and are appealing. The rest of the 612 still wait trial or sentence. They could hardly be optimistic now.

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