Bakhtiar recognized the futility of resisting. After pro-Khomeini
soldiers seized Iran’s military bases and overpowered the loyal
Imperial Guard, Bakhtiar disguised himself and fled for his life
to Paris.
To the U.S. government, the actions of Iran’s military were
exasperating. The defectors were using American weapons to
overthrow an American ally. During the early 1970s, when the
United States considered the shah an anchor for American
interests in the Middle East, it had sold a notable arsenal to the
Iranian Army. Some of those weapons now were being used by
a revolutionary force that soon would have American civilians
in their sights.
In Iran, few observers during the period of chaos doubted the
inevitable outcome. By February 11, it was all but over. Tehran
Radio, then in the hands of revolutionaries, announced, “The
dictatorship has come to an end.”^31
Middle East historian Roy Mottahedeh observed: “Khomeini
had sat first in Iraq, then (after October 1978) in Paris, and said,
‘The shah must go; the shah must go.’ Other leading mullahs,
including some of the ‘models’ in Qom, had been willing to
compromise with the shah’s government; but Khomeini had
not. He spoke the word without compromise, and finally the
shah left.”^32
Government under the shahs—the old Iran—was gone. Now,
the world watched to see how a new regime rooted in Islamic
fundamentalism would shape itself, and what life would be like
for Iran’s people in the decade of the 1980s.
The Shah’s Government Collapses 55