372 • 19 THE REASSERTION OF ISLAMIC POWERrole in US efforts to contain Soviet expansionism. When the Baghdad Pact
(later renamed the Central Treaty Organization, or CENTO) was formed in
1955, Iran joined. In the early 1960s Americans urged the shah to curb
those groups they viewed as blocking Iran's modernization: landlords,
ulama, and bazaar merchants. The White Revolution, proclaimed in 1963
after a popular referendum, called for land redistribution, nationalizing
Iran's forests, the sale of state-owned enterprises to private interests, elec¬
toral law changes to enfranchise women, profit sharing in industry, and the
formation of a literacy corps to aid village education. Riots instigated by
the Shi'i ulama broke out in various parts of Iran. One of the White Revo¬
lution's fiercest critics was a teacher in Qom, Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini.
The shah's secret police, SAVAK (largely trained by the US and Israel), used
various threats and inducements to silence him. When all else failed,
Khomeini was exiled. The shah used money and patronage to reward those
ulama who would endorse his policies. Some did. Others quietly disap¬
proved and subtly conveyed this attitude to their younger disciples in the
madrasas of Qom and Mashhad. One of Khomeini's most telling points in
mobilizing the ulama against the shah was his attack on an agreement ex¬
empting US civilian and military personnel from Iranian jurisdiction. Even
though such exemptions are common in foreign aid agreements, they re¬
minded Iranians of the Capitulations. Khomeini's campaign was aimed at
US influence, not just the White Revolution.
The shah's policies were revolutionary in their attempt to change the
lifestyle of the Iranian people. Their results, in terms of dams, bridges,
roads, schools, clinics, factories, and farmers' cooperatives, looked impres¬
sive. The upsurge of Iranian oil revenue, from $817 million in 1968 to
$2.25 billion in 1972-1973 to more than $20 billion in 1975-1976, fi¬
nanced a construction boom. The goals were bedeviled by bottlenecks:
long lines of ships waiting to unload, goods rotting on the piers for lack of
transport, and more trucks imported than there were Iranians trained to
drive and repair them. Iran's schools and universities proliferated and
turned out thousands of graduates who, especially in liberal arts, law, and
commerce, were too numerous for the economy to absorb. These gradu¬
ates, along with those pursuing science, medicine, and engineering, went
abroad to earn higher degrees. Many married foreigners, and never came
back. Those who did return, or who never left, chose to live in Tehran
rather than in the provincial cities and villages where their services were
most needed. The capital city swelled from about 1 million inhabitants in
1945 to 5 million in 1977. Its traffic congestion and smog became dreadful.
Apartment rents in Tehran rose fifteenfold between 1960 and 1975.