نشریه مطالعات تاریخی
پیاپی 47-48 (زمستان 1393 و بهار 1394)

Reaching the flames of WWII to Iran and Reza Shah’s departure brought an open political space to Iran. This space and the lack of strict control by the young Shah made it possible for the political parties to grow with different orientations. Among them was the Tudeh Party which established branches in different districts. The great oil wells and the affiliated industries in Khuzestan changed this province to a labor inhabited one and thus it was a good place for the development of Tudeh Party activities. In 1940s the hardships that the workers had to tolerate, the British attempts, and social conditions in Khuzestan paved the way for the activities of Tudeh Party. This research tries to show a part of this dominant atmosphere in Khuzestan and Tudeh Party activities in this province between 1941 and 1948 based on the existing documents.

Among the Muslim groups which chose to fight militarily with Pahlavi Regime, Mansouroun has a particular importance. The reason is not only some of Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps commanders (General Mohsen Rezaee, General Ali Shamkhani, General Gholamali Rashid, and General Mohammad Baqer Zulqadr) were its members but also this group was strictly persistent on getting the permission or order of all their activities from great Shia clergy leaders. Mansouroun members were among Imam Khomeini followers and believed in the presence of masses in the scenes of struggle against the Shah and his regime and Islamic Revolution was the outcome of his highness viewpoints. After the Islamic Revolution Mansouroun group took part in a coalition with some other Islamic groups and they created Mujahedin of Islamic Revolution Organization. Mansouroun never published its internal documents and consequently it is not easy to judge if they have had gotten the permission to assassinate the criminal agents of the Pahlavi regime from Imam Khomeini or other revolutionary clergy.

Analyzing the kind of relation between the government structure during the 2nd Pahlavi regime and its legitimacy crisis is a subject that needs more surveys; to find how the concentrated power in the hands of Mohammad Reza Shah helped his illegitimacy and ultimate collapse of his regime. Generally speaking a regime would have legitimacy and last when being able to decrease the control and concentration of power and note to the legitimate demands of society including political participation. And on the other side when a government holds all the power elements in its own hands and become ignorant to the respond the social needs, it would lose its legitimacy and will not last. The latter condition is a characteristic of neopatromonial rule. The political power structure in 2nd Pahlavi regime generally shows an authoritative structure that the Shah is on top and holds the power inclusively and is the main player in the country’s political arena.

After the Persian Constitutional Revolution, rule of king and courtoriented religious discourse were replaced with the rule of people through the elected parliament along with original religious discourse. However, incorrect implication of laws, incomplete conduct of Constitutional Revolution ideals, weakness of central government and Russian and British superpowers’ interventions in Iranian internal affairs expanded the risk increase of insecurity and separatism in the country. Reza Khan took the power in such conditions and with the British agreement. In order to create an individual centralist government, he tried to re-identify the new Iranian identity far apart from its original ethnic variation by emphasizing on ancient Persia, Islam-less Iran, and unique language, behavior and culture. But in order to promote this paradigm while having a westoxicated approach, he dictated the methods and concepts and at the same time followed some cultural policies and attempts; such as establishing National Heritage Association, Persian Language Academy, Thoughts Fostering Organization and Ferdowsi Millennium. However, all these attempts although having limited cultural usages, but they could not change the Iranian identity the way Reza Khan government intended.

After the occupation of Iran during WWII, the allies made corridor from north to the south of Iran and their military air shipments would be conducted with no fair of enemy antiaircraft fires. However, many air crashes happened that forced the pilot to have an emergency landing or fall. The occupiers would use all the facilities of Pahlavi Government to find their crashed airplanes and passengers inside Iranian soil. Surprisingly their demands would be afforded with no opposition or precondition from the Iranian government at that time. This article reminds one of these crashes that happened in Chahar Mahal & Bakhtiari and a group of Soviet Red Army soldiers died there and beside governmental documents in this regard the rural people memories around there have many interesting things to read and know. This article also tries to present some questions that there are no answers in documents or the local people memories and they would be the first step to conduct a survey about this event.

A SAVAK news piece with top secret category shows Mohammad Al-Zabareh, Northern Yemeni clergy, had made a trip to the holy city of Qum while having an official travel to Iran. During this trip he has asked to have a meeting with Grand Ayatollah Seyyed Shahabeddin Mar’ashi Najafi one the great Shia clergy leaders. However, Pahlavi officials who were his official hosts firstly tried to find out the Ayatollah Shari’atmadari’s idea about accepting this Yemeni clergy demand for a meeting. This matter shows they have tried to bring other Shia clergy leaders contacts under the control of Ayatollah Shari’atmadari and make these contacts depended to his acceptance and finally decrease the status and capabilities of Shia clergy leaders. On the other side, Grand Ayatollah Mar’ashi was not coaxed by Pahlavi officials and when Ayatollah Shari’atmadari agreed with this meeting, Mr. Mar’ashi would put a precondition that government agents should not be along with the Yemeni clergy at the time of meeting in his house. Thus, the regime agents impeded this meeting. This report is one of hundreds of documents that reveal the solidarity between Mr. Shai’atmadari and the Pahlavi regime and also the clear dependence of Grand Ayatollah Mar’ashi from the tyrant regime.

Upon unveiling order by Reza shah, it became a Non-skippable taboo across the country and breaking or failure in it’s implementation couldn’t be tolerable by the state. The following “No Comment Documents” is about the retribution of a low ranking officer who disregard the unveiling order. The phrase “Advancement of Women Movement” here is a ridiculous Interpretation of veil forbiddance for Women.