Word: tehran
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Dates: during 1980-1989
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Even the number of Iranian war victims reflects the country's political divisions. Iranian troops are split among the regular military, the fanatical Revolutionary Guards and the often ragtag volunteer corps known as the basij. During Iran's moderate phase in the mid-1980s, Tehran reduced the death toll by relying on trained professional soldiers for most of the fighting. Rafsanjani announced in 1985 that Iran intended "to achieve victory with as few casualties as possible." But last year champions of the zealous Guards gained a stronger voice in ruling circles. The Guards have scant concern for casualties and favor...
...relentless war with Iraq is only the most visible sign of Khomeini's determination to defeat heretics. No less important are Tehran's ties with the terrorist networks of Shi'ite radicals that stand ready to do the Ayatullah's bidding. Though tactics may shift, Khomeini's ultimate goal remains the same as when he came to power in Iran in 1979: to extend Shi'ite fundamentalism over all of Islam and recover the unity and power that the Muslim world has lost since the Middle Ages. "Khomeini is a one-track fanatic," contends a senior Israeli official...
Hizballah's ties to Tehran are abundantly clear. Leaders visit the Iranian capital regularly and reportedly get instructions from Iranian embassies in Damascus and Beirut. Khomeini is said to spend anywhere from $15 million to $50 million a year to finance Hizballah activities. Many Lebanese villages have so embraced Khomeini's way that their mosques and squares are adorned with pictures of the Ayatullah and even Iranian flags. Tehran reciprocates by putting pictures of Lebanese Shi'ite "martyrs" on Iranian postage stamps. Says Hussein Musawi, leader of the Hizballah-allied Islamic Amal: "We do not believe in the presence...
...Tehran's ties with Hizballah have put it into conflict with its friends as well. Though Syria depends on Iran for much of its oil, relations between the two countries have deteriorated recently over events in Lebanon. Hizballah fought Syria's forces after Syrian President Hafez Assad sent troops into Beirut last February to restore law-and-order. Now Hizballah-set bombs explode almost nightly near Syrian military posts in the Lebanese capital. Hizballah's most serious provocation came in June, when the group kidnaped U.S. Journalist Charles Glass near a Syrian checkpoint that was supposedly guarding the area...
...Tehran and Paris have been at daggers' points since mid-July, when France tried to question Wahid Gordji, an Iranian embassy translator. French police suspect that Gordji, who took refuge in the embassy, is linked to a string of Paris bombings last fall. When French officers surrounded the Iranian embassy to prevent Gordji's escape, Iran sealed off the French embassy in Tehran...