AN AUGURY OF REVOLUTION: THE IRANIAN STUDENT ...

shah’s regime, which by the early 1970s had become a very large segment of Iranian society.
According to the ISAUS, “their anti-imperialist, anti-reactionary battle is currently directed
against the puppet regime of the Shah of Iran and its principal supporter, U.S. imperialism.” 480
The view that the shah was a puppet of the United States “increased in scope today to fulfill the
‘Nixon Doctrine’ as the Gendarme of the Persian Gulf.” 481
On 30 May 1972, on their way back to Washington from a summit in Moscow, Nixon
and Kissinger stopped in Tehran to reaffirm their relationship with the shah. Iranian students
studying abroad were discussed at the meeting, and Nixon asked the shah, “Are your students
infected” 482
However, the main talking point of the meeting was military hardware and the role
of the shah in the Persian Gulf. At the meeting, Nixon asked the shah to “Protect me,” by
becoming a surrogate for American power in the Persian Gulf and Indian Ocean. 483
Consequently, the shah was given a blank check to purchase all the nonnuclear weapons that the
United States had to offer. Against the wishes of the Defense Department, the decision made by
Kissinger and Nixon “effectively exempted Iran from arms sales review processes in the State
and Defense Departments” and “created a bonanza for American weapons manufacturers, the
procurement branches of three U.S. services, and the Defense Security Assistance Agency.” 484
480 CISNU, Iranian Peoples’ Movement, 1953-1973, Iran Report, no. 2, June 1974, 1.
481 CISNU, Iranian Peoples’ Movement, 1953-1973, Iran Report, no. 2, June 1974, 1.
482 Memorandum of Conversation between Richard Nixon, Henry Kissinger, the Shah of Iran, 31 May 1972, FRUS
1969-1976, Vol. E-4, http://www.state.gov/r/pa/ho/frus/ (accessed on 26 February 2008).
483 Memorandum of Conversation between Richard Nixon, Henry Kissinger, the Shah of Iran, 31 May 1972, FRUS
1969-1976, Vol. E-4, http://www.state.gov/r/pa/ho/frus/ (accessed on 26 February 2008); Gary Sick, All Fall Down:
America’s Tragic Encounter with Iran (New York: Random House, 1985), 14.
484 Quote from the Senate Committee on Foreign Relations, Subcommittee on Foreign Assistance, Staff Report, U.S.
Military Sales to Iran (Washington, D.C.: Government Printing Office, 1976), viii-ix in Bill, The Eagle and the
Lion, 200.
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