A Government Collapses

Aftermath of a conflict that looked like the start of civil war

Perhaps the biggest danger facing Iran, after the stern Ayatullah Ruhollah Khomeini returned from exile, was a direct confrontation between army units loyal to Shah Mohammed Reza Pahlavi and civilian supporters of the Ayatullah. Last week it happened. Elite troops of the imperial guard, summoned to put down a rebellion by air force cadets, ran into a wall of armed civilians. Fighting continued, sporadically but bitterly, through the weekend, and Iran seemed to be staggering toward the brink of civil war. By Sunday more than 200 people had died. At that point, the supreme army command announced its neutrality in the country's political dispute and ordered the troops back to their barracks. Support by the military was the only thing propping up the regime of embattled Prime Minister Shahpour Bakhtiar. He had no choice except to resign, thereby clearing the way for Khomeini to transform Iran into an Islamic republic. The Ayatullah issued a statement claiming that "victory is near."

The fighting broke out at the Doshan Tappeh air force base in eastern Tehran; it was provoked by a skirmish between airmen supporting Khomeini and others loyal to the government. The Khomeini contingent was reinforced by thousands of civilians who rushed to the area, in what appeared to be a preplanned move. Joining them later were 8,000 leftists of the "Saihkal Marxist Group," which takes its name from a Caspian village seized by the Communists 14 years ago. As the crowds swirled into the area, leaders with bullhorns announced that men with military experience could pick up weapons at a nearby garage. Later, others broke into the base's armory and carried away its weapons.

The pro-Shah airmen at the base were no match for this force. The crowds quickly set up guard posts at the base gates and prepared for a counterattack. While men filled sandbags and gathered material for barricades, women wrapped in black chadors set about making Molotov cocktails. Although heavily armed Chinook helicopters cruised overhead all day long, no soldiers appeared through the haze from burning tires and garbage that covered the area.

Shortly after midnight, crack units of the Javidan guards, which had taken up positions along the road leading to the base, moved forward. As the fighting intensified and the gunfire became almost constant, private cars were commandeered to take the dead and dying to hospitals. One victim was Los Angeles Times Correspondent Joe Alex Morris Jr., 51, a veteran Middle East reporter, who was fatally shot in the chest by a bullet while watching the battle.

By morning the Iranian guards were in control of most of Doshan Tappeh, although scattered firing continued. Some 70 U.S. military and civilian technicians assigned to the training base, who had been trapped there by the fighting, were airlifted to safety by Iranian helicopters. The U.S. embassy, meanwhile, warned the 7,000 Americans still in Iran to remain indoors. Even though a 4:30 p.m. curfew was put in effect, many pro-Khomeini fighters ignored it to mount scattered attacks on Tehran police stations; the sound of machine-gun fire could be heard in all parts of the city. Residents of the capital, wise by now in the ways of survival, lined up at gasoline stations to fill their automobile tanks before the stations shut down once more.

The bloody round of fighting between soldiers and armed civilians introduced two troubling new factors into Iran's political situation. One factor was that militant Marxist forces--notably the long outlawed Communist (Tudeh) Party --may be stronger than outside observers had thought. The other was the possibility that Khomeini was not in total control of a revolution that until then he had orchestrated with considerable skill. The Ayatullah had not issued any calls to arms; indeed, many mullahs at the scene of the fighting pleaded that it was not time for armed revolution. Sound trucks, reportedly supplied by Khomeini, toured the area near the air-base urging demonstrators to go home; the loudspeakers were drowned out by the sound of battle and the klaxons of ambulances.

The army's Sunday announcement that it supported "the wishes of the people" presumably meant that it was prepared to live with Mehdi Bazargan, 71, a human rights activist and devout Muslim whom Khomeini last week chose as Prime Minister of his provisional government. An engineer by training, Bazargan is widely respected in Iran for his long record of opposition to the Shah; his friendship with Bakhtiar dates back to the early '50s, when both men served in the government of the late Mohammed Mossadegh, who was eventually ousted in a CIA-inspired coup. The day before the Doshan Tappeh confrontation, more than a million people paraded through the Tehran plaza that has been renamed Freedom Square chanting a new revolutionary slogan, "Dorood Bar Khomeini! Salaam Bar Bazargan!" (Hail to Khomeini! Greetings to Bazargan!)

Later, in a speech before 100,000 people at Tehran University, Bazargan called on his old friend Bakhtiar to step down, and announced a six-point program for a transfer of power. It would begin with a yes-no referendum on the creation of an Islamic republic and lead in stages to the turnover of governmental responsibility to Bazargan. Significantly, he stopped short of naming members of his Cabinet, an action that might have forced an immediate showdown with Bakhtiar.

Bazargan, whom one Tehran newspaper called "a political mullah without a turban," also tried to defuse the army. Blaming "sadistic" elements in the military for perpetrating violence "unheard of since Genghis Khan," he last week implored the armed forces to recognize that their oaths to the Shah had been overtaken by events. "The mandate to the

Shah did not come from God," he argued, "but from the people, and the people have taken it back." He warned that the military faced "the revenge of God" if it did not abandon Bakhtiar's government.

The Prime Minister's only support was from the military--and even that proved to be illusory. In Isfahan and other Iranian cities, Khomeini supporters occupied municipal offices. Bazargan, however, made no move to seize any ministries in Tehran--not that there was much to seize. The majority of government employees had declared their rejection of Bakhtiar's regime, and even some staff members in his own office went on strike.

Deputies in the Majlis (lower house of parliament) continued to submit their resignations. One description of Bakhtiar's government: "Little more than a telephone." On Sunday crowds sacked and burned his office.

The maneuvering between the rival Prime Ministers, commented one Western observer last week, was "a risky game of chicken." Bazargan and Khomeini, who set up headquarters at a girls' school in Tehran, obviously hoped to isolate Bakhtiar and force his resignation. Until the army announced its neutrality, Bakhtiar had insisted that any transfer of power be done in accordance with the 1906 constitution, which had become something of a symbol of order to the military. The collapse of the Prime Minister's government, however, made that issue academic.

Aware that the U.S. role in supporting the Shah remains a sensitive issue to Khomeini's supporters, the Administration last week was adopting a more conciliatory posture. President Carter abruptly recalled General Robert Huyser from Tehran. Huyser, the deputy commander of U.S. forces in Europe, had been sent to Iran a month ago to dissuade the country's military leaders from attempting a coup. Antigovernment forces accused Huyser of plotting to push the army into power and place the Shah back on the Peacock Throne.

Carter called two special sessions with top foreign policy advisers and insisted that they curtail any substantive comment on Iran policy. One official who did speak out was Andy Young, the ambassador to the United Nations; he predicted that "Khomeini will be somewhat of a saint when we get over the panic." Said Presidential Aide Jody Powell when asked about the remark: "The U.S. Government is not in the canonization business."

Reported TIME Correspondent William Drozdiak from Washington: "The Carter crackdown reflected a fear that any policy dissonance would further prejudice U.S. interests in Iran and the Persian Gulf region at large. Despite Carter's open endorsement of the Bakhtiar regime last month, U.S. officials were quietly pleased by Khomeini's choice of Bazargan as transitional Prime Minister. He is viewed by Washington as a patient, conciliatory figure who can get the oilfields pumping again and possibly harness the disparate opposition forces as well as the nervous pro-Shah elements within the military leadership. State Department specialists who have contacted Bazargan find him amenable to the notion of friendly relations with the U.S."

Washington has no illusions that the days of Iran as a client state are finished. Bazargan and his colleagues, says one American official who has just returned from Iran, "are looking for indications of American support toward a more neutral posture of open trade relations but without military patronage."

The prevailing view in Washington, as one Administration policymaker put it, was that "there's little we can do at this stage." The judgment is undoubtedly correct, but the seeming inability of the U.S. to influence events in Iran could have a serious impact on Washington's relations with other states in the Middle East's crescent of crisis. Ever since Mos cow moved to make Ethiopia its chief client on the Horn of Africa, the Saudis have complained about the waning of U.S. influence in the area. Says a State Department analyst: "The Saudis are taking a hard look now at their relations with Washington. They seem more worried than ever that a republic like the U.S. does not really have a terribly deep commitment to protecting monarchies."

To bolster the confidence of such apprehensive allies, Defense Secretary Harold Brown left last week on a ten-day tour of the Middle East. Among other matters, he would like to seal arrangements with Saudi Arabia to provide $200 million in military aid to buttress North Yemen against any possible incursions from the pro-Moscow regime in South Yemen. The U.S. also hopes to elicit a reaffirmation of continued Saudi financial aid for Egypt. In addition, the Administration is focusing on ways to enhance U.S. ties with Riyadh. Any tangible decline in U.S.-Saudi relations might force Egyptian President Anwar Sadat to adopt a tougher stance in peace treaty negotiations with Israel. "What's happened in Iran," admits a State Department official, "has forced us to examine a lot of unseen forces that bubbled below the surface in the Middle East."

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