February 22, 1921, an obscure officer of the ragtag Persian Imperial
Cossack Brigade leads a Putsch which over the years has
become better known as the Coups d'état of 1921, and Issues a
nine clause Promulgation which starts off by audaciously declaring:
"I Command!" - thus ensuring it to be recorded as one of
Contemporary Iran's most extraordinary political acts. The last
Qajar King of Kings, Sultan Ahmad Shah, the last Crown of a two
centuries old Dynasty, cowering in his palace, is incapable of
mustering a counter force to confront a couple hundred disorganized
mostly bare feet Cossack troops who simply marched into the Capital
of the Persian Empire virtually unopposed and led by the hitherto
unknown Colonel Reza (Mir panj Rezaa Khaan). The Shah ignominiously
acquiesces in letting it go unchallenged the brazen self-conferring
of the Title of "Commander-in-Chief" by Colonel Reza when he signed
his First Decree of "I Command!"
Koodetaa-ye Sevom-e Esfand 1299 (The Coup of 3rd Esfand 1299
or The February 22, 1921, Coup), also known originally as the
Koodetaa-ye Sevom-e Hoot 1299, is thus the start of the End of the
two centuries old Qajar Dynasty, and is the Beginning of the Modern
Iran.
Colonel Reza, thus ushered in an unprecedent sociol-economic-political
Change of Power. From this very first day, he continued his strong
arm tactics by dragging the hopelessly chaotic Persia from the
plight of the "Dark Ages" into the threshold of the Twentieth
Century. The paradox of Modern Iran has thus began! A virtual no
body suspends the fledgling Constitutional Process, forces the
Parliament Approved Premier, Sepahdaar-e Rashti, to flee for his
life into the much cursed British Embassy, and the Shah
humiliatingly beg for the safety of his own life with the British
Ambassador; and yet the vaunted Constitutionalist Founding Fathers
remain utterly silent!
The emotionally highly charged History of Iran has still not been
able to fully analyze the dynamism of this fateful Day. Who was
Colonel Reza? How did he get to lead an incongruous force of a few
hundred poorly fed and irregularly paid Cossacks march into the
Capital virtually unopposed? Why was the Public Opinion so terribly
against the Constitutional Shah and Government and Parliament? Who
paid whom? Who sponsored whom? Why? How? ...
Indeed the context in which the Putsch of 1921 took place,
has shaped much of Iran's Modern National Psychic. Was it the
infamous Anglo-Persian Agreement of 1919? Or was it the Bolshevik
Revolution of 1918? Was it the institutionalized inherent
incompetence and corruption within the Constitutional Order of Iran?
Over simplification and categorization has definitely not provided a
meaningful response to all of the above questions. As long these
are not fully and completely analyzed, maybe Iran's continuing
vexations of the 1950s, and 1970s will surely never be fully
comprehended. And Iran will be the source of much greater
unpleasantness in the coming decades. So may so called experts of
1970s Iran have failed to give proper attention to this Fateful Day
of Modern Iran.
Colonel Reza who rose to be the Founder of the Pahlavi Dynasty some
four years later, was certainly Iran's most important personality of
the past century. The changes he instituted were the most profound
and dynamic of Iran's History ever. Friend and foe admit that
Modern Iran was created and shaped almost single-handedly by him
during his four years of Military Rule plus another sixteen years of
Imperial Reign.
"Worldly fame is
but a breath of wind that blows now this way, and now that, and
changes name as it changes direction." -Dante
Alighieri
February 25,
1954 - Gamal Abdel Nasser after a silent creeping Coup, arrested
General Muhammad Naguib, the leader of Egypt, who had been his long
time friend, fellow officer, and partner in the military coup which
overthrew King Farouk I. Nasser thus became the new Prime Minister
of Egypt. Over the next two decades he led Egypt into two crushing
and humiliating defeats, destroyed the thriving economy of Egypt,
instituted a stern Police State, impoverished his Peoples by massive
external debts to finance megalomanic projects, wrought havoc
throughout the Middle East with hysteric Pan-Arabism policies, and
left a legacy of tragic populism and demagoguery. There are many
who regard his Era with Nostalgia for assuring Egypt's dominance in
the Non-Aligned Nations Movement. He is noted more for his
extraordinary ability to whip the Crowds into a frenzy the World has
rarely witnessed before or after.
"Dignity does not
consist in possessing honors, but in deserving them."
-Aristotle
George Washington (1732 - 1799)
was the first President
under the Constitution of the United States of America.
And as such, he is recognized by Americans as
"The Father of our Country."
This earliest known image of Washington in which he is identified as
such
is on the cover of a c.1778 Pennsylvania German almanac,
Lancaster "Gedruckt bey Francis Bailey".
There he is identified as "Landes Vater" or "The Father of the
Land".
February 22, 1732 - George Washington was born in Westmoreland
County, Virginia, into a slave owning plantation holder family. His
parents, Augustine Washington and Mary Ball were of English descent.
~~0~~
February 25, 1793 - George Washington, United States of America's
First Constitutional President, chairs the First Ever Cabinet
Meeting of any American Administration.
"The
part can never be well unless the whole is well."
-Plato
February 25,
1921: The Georgian Socialist Soviet Republic was ushered in after
the Red Army invaded the Democratic Republic of Georgia (DRG) in
support of a Bolshevik coup there. DRG was the first Republic of
Georgia, and it was the first of all the Caucasian Republics to
declared independence following the Dissolution of the short lived
Transcaucasia Republic on May 26, 1918. The Menshevik President of
DRG, Noe Zhordania, which had only concluded a Peace Treaty with the
Soviet Russia was deposed and exiled to Paris. Zhordania was a
Georgian Social-Democratic Party Leader who had started out as the
Russian Social Democratic Labor Party, and had joined the Menshevik
Faction of the State Council of Russia. Zhordania's inability to
foresee the Lenin's true intentions and his attempts at reaching a
compromise with Moscow finally cost his Nation her independence for
some seventy years and untold destruction of her uniquely rich
Heritage.
Prepared by Nader Rastegar
"Myths are sometimes created by peoples and governments who reshape
the actual past to something nearer their wishes and intentions."
-Professor
E. Bruce Brooks, University of Massachusetts at Amherst
On Monday, February 21, 1972, President Richard Nixon made History
by Visiting the People's Republic of China (PRC) for a week. Upon
arrival, President Nixon was taken to meet with the Communist Party
Chairman Mao Zedong (Mao Tse-Tung). Even though that was the
Highlight of the whole Trip because of the symbolism of the Meeting,
the substance of that Trip was in the daily extensive Talks held
with the Premier Zhou Enlai (Chou En Lai). The Trip lasted exactly
one week.
The declassified US National Archives Documents of the once highly
classified "Top Secret/Sensitive/Exclusively Eyes Only" category
reveal some extraordinary level of amity and frankness between the
two Leaders. At the First Round of Talks at the Great Hall of the
People, Beijing (Peking), from 5:58-6:55 PM, on the day of arrival
of President Nixon, Prime Minister Zhou Enlai opened the Meeting by
observing:
"We have too many elderly people in our leadership. So on this
point we should learn from you. I have found that you have many
young men ..."
The following excerpts of that Talk reveal much about the changes
that had occurred since the Foundation of the PRC: P.M. Zhou: "As you said to Chairman Mao this afternoon,
today we shook hands, but John Foster Dulles didn't want to do
that." President Nixon: "But you said you didn't want to shake
hands with him." P.M. Zhou: "Not necessarily. I would have. ... His
assistant, Mr. Walter Bedell Smith, he wanted to do differently, but
he did not break the discipline of John Foster Dulles, so he had to
hold a cup of coffee in his right hand and, as generally one doesn't
shake hands with the left hand, so he used his left hand to shake my
arm. ... the international viewpoint was that the socialist
countries were a monolithic bloc, and the Western countries were a
monolithic bloc. But that is not the case. Now we understand." President Nixon: "We have broken out of old pattern. We
look at each country in terms of its own conduct rather than lumping
them all together ... And I would say in honesty to the Prime
Minister that my views, because I was in the Eisenhower
Administration, were similar to those of Mr. Dulles at that time.
But the world has changed since then ..."
"Let us go on destroying myths. And if there are no myths, let us
create them first to allow their destruction!"
-Professor
Yuri Pines, The Hebrew University of Jerusalem
Prepared using the US National Archives, Nixon Presidential
Materials Collection, President's Office Files, Memoranda for the
President, Box 87, "Beginning February 20, 1972".
