There is an interesting episode about this in a 1985 British documentary called "End of Empire". If I am not mistaken, all episodes are on YouTube except one. It seems an agent gave an interview for the episode on Iran and accidentally (?) mentioned his employer's involvement in the 1953 coup. This was deleted from the final script.
More recently, an Iranian film maker made an another interesting documentary chasing up the details surrounding this edited script and what may have been deleted. It starred Ralph Fiennes as the agent being interviewed:
Probably the same place. Islamic theocratic was on the rise in that area in the 70s - it's likely Ayatollah Khomeini would come to power one way or another - possibly even via elections. Just like Islamists did elsewhere after the Arab spring.
Mosaddegh was a marxist, supported by Russia, who tried to play both sides to advance a personal agenda of Persian ascendancy. Had he not been overthrown, the Russians would have eventually lost patience and killed him; or the radical islamists would have eventually overthrown him with the assistance of regional Arab players not keen on an ascendant Iran, with Marxist leanings. They would've wrongly believed an Islamist Iran would be easier to align than a secular/marxist regime.
Just a little nitpick - US didn't finance Taliban. Taliban was formed after Russia stopped occupation in Afghanistan. Taliban was formed because US stopped paying attention.
That’s a bit of a moot point. The actual human beings forming the military backbone of the “Taliban” were all fighters trained by the Pakistani ISI (at the behest of and sponsored by the United States) in order to fight Soviets. The US distributed a lot of brainwashing material to Taliban madarsas etc.
No the point is not obvious. We spent 25 years getting pictures of extremely isolated instances of afghans wearing western clothes as some justification for continued occupation. Exactly the same playbook tried with Iran.
Is the point to foster renewed interest in occupation by sharing misleading photos of isolated locations?
Operation cyclone led directly to the creation of the taliban.
These photos (how many of photos there are at all from that period in Afghanistan?) show that Afghan women were able to wear highly revealing clothing in public, like were Iranian women at the time. Something that this day is extremely unlikely in Afghanistan and Iran.
Different histories, same outcome - the point being - we really do not know what would have happened in Iran.
If you didn't know then Iranian revolution did not start as Islamic revolution. It started as popular revolution against shah but the other revolutionaries were eliminated by the Islamists.
The point is both countries have been infiltrated by western powers who support either tyrannical religious zealots or liberal causes whenever it suits their political interests which results in societies that tear themselves apart. And the societies tearing themselves apart is the feature not the bug.
i would never get into a helicopter, they dont have wings! how you gonna even attempt a crash landing if things go wrong? and you cant parachute out of one with giant blades spinning above your head... part of me thinks its an IQ test.
Autorotation allows for a landing in the case of power loss, this is an old technique. It can still lead to a hard landing, but it's not totally uncontrolled.
Except for the fact that he called for its destruction repeatedly. Provided missiles, drones, weapons and trainings to its enemies... It's speculated the Oct 7th attack was based on a direct order from Tehran due to their fear of normalization between Israel and the Saudis.
I don't think Israel did this mostly because it's subtle and the current Israeli government doesn't tend to do subtle. But I won't be surprised.
Which of my multiple assertions were not him? Is he not responsible for the executions of thousands of dissidents? Did he not wish frequently for the destruction of Israel? Is he not behind the subjugation of women?
You're framing this as Israel, Iran etc. The problem is in specific governments not inherently in the countries. Israel and Iran used to have a great relationship before the Islamic revolution. Many Iranian expats live in Israel. People like Raisi are a huge part of the problem. He's one of the boogiemen who Netanyahu (and people like him) use to rise to power.
The other being the Ayatollah, given his history of constantly shuffling around people in power from different branches, and not tolerating family members in politics, in order to prevent stable institutions (or family) overthrowing him...
>A helicopter carrying Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi suffered a “hard landing” on Sunday, Iranian state media reported, without elaborating. Some began urging the public to pray for Raisi and the others on board as rescue crews sped through a misty, rural forest where his helicopter was believed to be.
No details at all, presumably not much will be known until it is found. Presumably if Iran had even a tiny reason to blame it on an enemy, they would already be doing that.
Or an accident that they try to pass as an assassination attempt, or an internal attack they try to pass as a foreign attack. Who knows. We certainly do not.
How would this benefit Israel? Wouldn’t Khamanei just appoint someone equally or potentially even more extremist? Killing a general is one thing because there is experience and wisdom lost but politicians are largely replaceable.
But it would have made vastly more sense to do that when Israel had casus belli after Iran’s massive drone strike last month. Also, fighting a two-front war is very difficult even under ideal conditions (see: Hitler).
The odds are against this being an accident. On the other hand a few other presidents and ex-presidents would help us all if they disappeared in accidents
Also, weather in the region apparently isn’t good for safely flying helicopters (FTA: “He said the visibility in the mountainous and wooded area was down to only about five meters.”)
That, to me, doesn’t support a claim “The odds are against this being an accident”. Do you have data that does?
All else being the same, Iranian aircraft will actually be likelier to be involved in accidents than aircraft in similar countries, due to the unavailability of spare parts caused by western sanctions.
