Iran in 2026 is not the Iran of 1979

Images of the mass anti-government protests in Iran may be reminiscent of the popular revolt that toppled the Shah in 1979, but that is where the similarities stop. Based in Tehran at the time, I covered the revolution that was the Islamic Republic’s midwife. employing the kind of violence Iran’s current Islamist leaders are capable of. That is not say that hardline supporters of the Shah and senior military commanders rejected a brutal crackdown. On the contrary. Men like Ardeshir Zahedi, the Shah’s influential son-in-law and storied ambassador to the United States, Major General Manouchehr Khosrodad, the founder and commander of the army’s airborne wing, Nematollah Nassiri, the head of Savak, Iran’s feared intelligence agency, Major General Reza Naji, the tough Isfahan martial law commander, and Tehran police chief and martial law administrator Mehdi Rahimi had little compunction about killing thousands to salvage the Shah’s regime. They made that clear at a dinner hosted by Mr. Zahedi.