Carter and 1979: the untold story from Israel's military attaché in Iran

As US President Jimmy Carter was laid to rest this week, the specter of 1979 arose anew. For Yitzhak Segev, Israel's last military attaché in Iran before the Islamic Revolution, Carter shares blame for the ayatollahs' rise.

“He [Carter] did all he could to push the Shah out without thinking who would replace him,” General Brigadier Yitzhak Segev told Iran International. “Carter spoke against the Shah and criticized him.”

"I'm not saying the regime of the Shah was good or not corrupt. I am not saying Savak was good also, but every time you must think about how to continue or who will be the replacement," Segev added, referring to the late monarch Mohammed Reza Pahlavi's feared spy agency.

Segev served as military attaché in Iran from 1977 to 1979, escaping after Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini returned to Iran in February 1979 in a triumphant defeat of the Shah, who had announced he was going on "vacation".

Segev provided his eye-witness accounts, conversations and observations from the years leading to the revolution and its aftermath.

As an elite officer in the Israeli military, Segev had direct conversations with Carter and American, Iranian and Israeli government and military officials in the run-up to the Islamic revolution that transformed the monarchy into an Islamic theocracy.

While Segev said he respects Carter, praising him as a human rights trailblazer and statesman for his role in the Camp David Accords that brought peace between Egypt and Israel, he said the Democratic president let Iran down.

“His treatment of Iran was catastrophic.”

Carter’s role in Iran is a lightning rod of controversy. Many in the Iranian diaspora flocked to social media when learning of Carter’s death on Dec. 29 to again blame him for the rise of Khomeini.

Segev, who continued to have friendly relations with Carter after the 1979 revolution, said the late president believed the end of the Shah’s 37-year reign and 2500 years of monarchy in Iran would lead to democracy.

Carter’s championing of democracy and human rights drove that belief, in Segev’s view. The Americans, he said, naively thought Khomeini, an anti-communist, would protect American interests and felt the Shah had already lost control of the country and was doomed.

General Robert Husyer was dispatched to Tehran as a US envoy in 1979 on a secret mission to meet with the Iranian army, according to Segev, in an account corroborated by declassified US documents and a Husyer's memoir.

“Instead of coming to the army and building confidence with the army or promoting a replacement from the army or civilian (leadership) that would keep relations with America and the West, he really pushed for democracy,” Segev told Eye for Iran.

It would later be revealed that many of these Iranian generals were planning their defection and some even joined the anti-Shah movement.

Husyer in his memoir said Carter’s administration had not ruled out US support for a coup. According to Husyer’s memoir and Segev’s recollections, Zbigniew Brzezinski, the national security advisor, advocated for immediate action but Cyrus Vance, the secretary of state, opposed a coup.

“Brzezinski wanted [his order] to convey to the Iranian military a green light to stage a military coup. President Carter intended it to convey such a meaning only as a last resort,” Huyser wrote in this memoir.

Within the US government, officials were divided about what to do about its flailing Mideast ally amid backdrop of the Cold War.

Carter’s quest for democracy may have blinkered him on Khomeini’s true intentions, Segev said, and the prevailing threat to the Americans at the time was communism.

“The unusual story is that before Khomeini landed President Carter called the president of France and the president of Germany and told them: ‘don't worry, I checked about Khomeini and he is not communist’,” Segev said.

The BBC published a report in 2016 based on declassified US diplomatic cables saying Carter had contacts with Khomeini and his representatives in Tehran prior to his takeover.

Khomeini, who was in exile in Paris at the time, reportedly assured the Americans he would restore stability and that American interests would be protected in a series of letters he sent to Carter.

Islamic Republic officials have repeatedly denied any secret correspondence with a nation Khomeini referred to as the “great Satan.”

Officials who worked closely with Carter like Stuart Eizenstat, the president's chief domestic policy adviser, blame the Shah for the Islamic Republic's rise.

"Jimmy Carter did not lose Iran, the Shah did," Eizenstat said in a eulogy at the late president’s funeral on Thursday.

In attendance were President Joe Biden, President-elect Donald Trump and all other living former US presidents, making for a rare re-litigation of the hotly disputed events of 1979 before the country's most senior leaders.

Regrets?

A few years after the 1979 revolution, Segev met with President Carter and Cyrus Vance at a peace conference in Atlanta.

Curious about the Carter administration's conclusions after Khomeini had solidified power, he spoke to the former President and Vance, directly asking the latter if he had any regrets about US actions during the 1979 revolution.

“I told him: 'I must ask you. Now after the revolution, how do feel?' He told me that he felt big regret and it was a big mistake,” said Segev, who said he asked the same of Carter later that night.

“President Carter did not show any regret,” he said.

Israeli offer of help

In 1978, as anti-Shah sentiment was growing and spreading outside Iran's capital, the Israelis offered Tehran help.

Israeli military leader and politician Moshe Dayan and Segev met with Nematollah Nassiri, the head of Iran’s former intelligence agency Savak.

The meeting did not go as the Israeli officials had anticipated, Segev said.

“I remember the meeting now after 45 years like it happened yesterday,” he said.

“Nassiri’s son was on his leg and Dayan told him ‘General Nasiri, Segev told me that there are big demonstrations. I came here to offer you any help from Israel.’"

"Nasiri told him, ‘don't worry, everything is under control. We control the situation. We don't need anything. We have everything. But if you are here, let's talk about the war between Ethiopia and Somalia’,” said Segev.

Segev recalls leaving the meeting disappointed and said Dayan told him, "‘I'm ashamed to tell you this. Nassiri is senile. Let's leave him.’"

To learn more about Segev’s escape from Iran and his meeting with Ayatollah Mohammad Hossein Beheshti, one of the leaders of the Islamic Revolution, watch or listen to Eye for Iran Episode 33. You can watch on YouTube or Listen on Spotify, Apple, Amazon, Castbox or any major podcast platform.