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Iran in turmoil as Shah departs

Broadcast Date: Jan. 15, 1979

After more than a year of escalating protests, the Islamic revolution in Iran reaches a prime goal in January 1979: the overthrow of Mohammad Reza Shah Pahlavi. But the Shah's exit brings no end to street demonstrations and gas shortages in the capital of Tehran. The new civilian government, headed by Shapour Bakhtiar, has little credibility with anyone in Iran, especially Ayatollah Khomeini, an exiled cleric who fiercely opposes the Shah. This in-depth report from CBC-TV's Newsmagazine examines the possible outcomes for Iran without the Shah.

Iran in turmoil as Shah departs

• Mohammad Reza Shah Pahlavi was the last monarch in the Iranian royal family to rule Iran (which was known as Persia until 1935). His father, Reza Shah Pahlavi, was deposed by Allied forces during the Second World War, and the younger Pahlavi took his place in 1941.

• In 1953 the Shah left Iran temporarily after ongoing conflict with prime minister Mohammed Mosaddeq, who had taken steps to nationalize Iran's oil industry. But Mosaddeq was ousted in a coup backed by the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency, and the Shah returned.

• By the 1970s Iranians all along the political spectrum, from hardline Islamic clerics to the usually apolitical merchant class to left-wing students, were chafing under the Shah's increasingly heavy-handed rule. The Islamists viewed him as overly close with the decadent United States, and those on the left were enraged by his clampdown on freedom of expression and the use of torture by SAVAK, the Iranian secret police.

Iran in turmoil as Shah departs

Medium: Television

Program: Newsmagazine

Broadcast Date: Jan. 15, 1979

Guest(s): Abbas Amirie, Shapour Bakhtiar, Raji Samghabadi

Host: Knowlton Nash
Reporter: Don McNeill

Duration: 26:28

Last updated:
June 23, 2009