Word: khomeini
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Moscow-Tehran relations have, in fact, long been characterized by mutual and mistrustful exploitation. The Soviets were far from enthusiastic in their support for Khomeini in the months just before his 1979 overthrow of the Shah. The reason, as a Tudeh member now in jail puts it, was that "Moscow perceived the clergy as incorrigible reactionaries." Those fears were well founded. Right-wing clergymen routinely reviled the Soviets as godless Communists, while Khomeini opposed the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan. But Moscow wooed Tehran by offering assistance against the nettlesome Mujahedin guerrillas. In response, the mullahs invited KGB agents to Iran...
...Khomeini finds a convenient new scapegoat: the Communists
...After seven colleagues elaborated on the details of their treachery, Ali Amou'i, a ranking Central Committee member, warned Iranian youths not to follow his example and calmly declared the dissolution of the entire Tudeh Party. Then, heaping insult upon injury, the Islamic regime of Ayatullah Ruhollah Khomeini informed 18 Soviet diplomats that they would have 48 hours to leave Iran. Proclaimed a triumphant Khomeini: "The Islamic umma [nation] of Iran should glory in its self-sacrificing and devoted combatants who have ensnared the treacherous Tudeh Party chiefs...
Those words seemed more important than the gaudy actions that preceded them. Despite its fanatical loyalty to Moscow, the widely reviled and politically ineffective Tudeh Party (membership: between 2,000 and 3,000) seemed to be nothing more than a symbolic victim. Many analysts noted that Khomeini thrives on crisis, habitually seeking to dramatize his strength and distract his restive populace by pummeling some scapegoat. Past offenders have included the U.S., which Khomeimi frequently calls the great Satan," the Mujahedin-e Khalq guerrillas, who oppose the regime, and the army of neighboring Iraq. Late last year, Khomeini added the Soviet...
...warned Agence France-Presse that the strike was "part of the Iranian revolution's campaign against imperialist targets throughout the world." The man identified himself as a member of the Islamic Jihad Organization, an obscure pro-Iranian group made up of Shi'ite Muslims loyal to Ayatullah Khomeini. Yet within a day, two other terrorist groups had also claimed responsibility. Though the attacker remains unknown, the motive was not in doubt: to bully Washington and upset the course of U.S. policy in the Middle East...