MER Article From the Editors (November/December 1980) The Iraq-Iran war and the September 12 military coup in Turkey brought our attention to the October travel itineraries of some high-level US military policy planners. Gen. David Jones, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, was conveniently in Saudi Arabia to phone Washington for the dispatch of AWA The Editors • 3 min read
MER Article What the Carter Doctrine Means to Me The following document is edited from the official transcript of a speech by Secretary of Defense Harold Brown to the Council on Foreign Relations in New York City on March 6, 1980. The 1970s closed with the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan. The 1980s opened with the ensuing debate, both in this coun (Author not identified) • 12 min read
MER Article Chronology: US-Egyptian Military Relationship 1974 February 28 Kissinger and Sadat, in Cairo, announce US-Egyptian diplomatic relations to resume, following June 1967 rupture. March 18 State Department announces US Navy will help clear mines from Suez Canal. April 18 Sadat announces Egypt ending 18 years of reliance on Soviet arms. April 19 Danny Reachard, Joe Stork • 9 min read
MER Article Pakistan and US Strategy How would you characterize the situation in Pakistan today? The most striking thing about the present regime is the extraordinary degree of its isolation. It is a regime which, from one end of the country to another, does not seem to have any popular support. It lacks even the support of vested int Eqbal Ahmad • 21 min read
MER Article War Games for the Eighties For most of the 1970s, the possibility of US military intervention in the Persian Gulf region inspired military training exercises designed to simulate combat experience in a hot, desert environment. The course of events in Iran, Saudi Arabia and elsewhere in 1979 has lent a new urgency to these int Michael Klare • 6 min read
MER Article The Carter Doctrine and US Bases in the Middle East On Thursday, July 10, a squadron of 12 brown and green camouflaged F-4E Phantom fighter-bombers landed at Cairo West Air Base after a non-stop 13-hour flight from Moody Air Base in Georgia. A week earlier five C-141s and 28 C-5s airlifted some 4 million pounds of equipment and supplies and more than Joe Stork • 38 min read
MER Article From the Editors (September/October 1980) We had just sent our February issue on the Gulf off to the printer when Jimmy Carter, in his State of the Union message of January 23, announced that any challenge to the historic US sphere of influence in the Gulf region would provoke US military intervention. In this issue we document and analyze The Editors • 2 min read
MER Article Letter (June 1980) To the Editors: Your issue on the left forces in Iran (MERIP Reports 86) was interesting and informative, albeit somewhat dated. I found Ervand Abrahamian’s essay to be an altogether good description of the origins and development of the guerrilla movement in Iran. While I disagree with the importan (Author not identified) • 7 min read
MER Article Halliday, Iran: Dictatorship and Development Fred Halliday, Iran: Dictatorship and Development (Harmondsworth: Penguin Books, 1979). The Iranian revolution of 1978-1979 was a momentous historical event. It probably involved a greater proportion of any country’s population in direct insurrectionary action than has any previous revolution. In t Robert Dillon • 6 min read
MER Article Khomeini: "We Shall Confront the World with Our Ideology" The following speech, written by Ayatollah Khomeini on the eve of the Iranian New Year, is his most comprehensive summary of his political philosophy and world outlook. Here Khomeini lays out not only his concept of revolutionary Islam -- an aspect of his thought well-known in the West -- but also t (Author not identified) • 14 min read
MER Article Ahvaz Steel Workers' Strike The workers of the Foster Wheeler-Tehran Jonub Company, part of the Ahvaz Steel Industry Contractors Company, today ended their 56-day strike following a meeting with Hojjat-ol-Islam Jannati and Engineer Gharavi, governor of Khuzestan. Dr. Sheybani, member of the board of directors for the National (Author not identified) • 2 min read
MER Article Iran's Oil Workers A shroud of silence seems to have enveloped Iran’s oil industry since last fall when the top oil official Hassan Nazih was dismissed under charges of treason, allegedly for failing to purge non-Islamic elements from the ranks of the National Iranian Oil Company (NIOC). Even production and export fig Joe Stork • 2 min read
