20A The Tar Heel Thursday, July 31, 1980.
commentary and analysis
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William Durham, Editor
Amy Sharpe, Managing Editor
Elliott Warnock, Associate Editor
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John Royster, News Editor
Clifton Barnes, Sports Editor
Susan Mauney, Assistant News
Editor
Sarah West, Features Editor
Tom Moore, Arts Editor
Sharon Clarke, Photography
Editor
A lesson from the shah
Shah Mohammed Reza Pahlavi is dead, and the world waits wearily to
find out just what effect his death will have on the fate of the hostages.
While it waits, and it will be, no doubt, a lengthy wait, some thoughts on
the shah and his life are in order. Perhaps his fall can teach us a lesson in
reality.
As has been chronicled in the free press throughout the world, he ran a
repressive regime. However, although there can be no excuses for his
brutality, he used his power, and his wealth, to try to bring his people into
closer touch with modernity and even with some of the values of Western
democracies. He benefited from the manipulation of OPEC oil prices, but
used much of his revenue on internal development programs.
The shah also spent a great deal of his wealth on arms; and used this
power to become one of the United States' strongest allies in the Middle
East. As Henry Kissinger said, the shah "was a good friend of the United
States who stood by seven presidents of both parties for over 35 years of
rule."
The shah understood, of thought he understood, that dissent in an
emerging nation can be harmful to its forward progress. Many leaders of
backward countries have operated on this principal in the past, and many
will continue to do so in the future. The shah was attempting, at one blow, v
to transform Iran from the dusty back shelves of the nineteenth century
into a twentieth-century superpower. He almost succeeded; but his pace
was too fast for his country.
As a man, then, the shah was not the devil incarnate that various rabid
Iranian factions, both in Iran and abroad, have, branded him; he was
simply wrong, as men often are.
As the shah's domestic problems compounded through the 70s, the
major cause stressed abroad was the shah's repressiveness. And as the
protests became louder, the Carter administration began, in its evangelistic
attempt to police world morals, to chastise the shah, demanding that he
loosen his grasp. And, as his end neared, U.S. officials suggested that he go
quietly.
Much of this withdrawal of support came as a result of American
idealism and naivete. However prevalent and cooed-over in the United
States, idealism is a rare commodity in the nasty world. The shah knew,
and most of the rest of the world knows, that when progress is made,
someone must often be hurt. '
This is not to suggest that the shah's methods are correct. But American
idealism is no excuse for the shabby treatment We afforded the shah.
The United States is not protected from the problems of the world by our
distance from them. Some nations are vital to our economy or security, so
the United States supports their dictators, however distasteful a task this is.
Idealism often must be swallowed in place of realism.
The fate of the shah, and the concomitant blow to American security and
prestige, is an example of what happens when - idealism mixes with
pragmatic politics. The sickening result is a regime equally as repressive,
infinitely more reactionary and, if anything, further from a liberal
deomocracy than the shah's rule ever was. -
The elaborate attempt of the United States to dissociate itself from the
shah's stigma has netted us, ironically, riothing. There is every sign that
whoever is claiming control in the shambles that is Iran will refuse to let
the shah's death change the hostage situation. This, in spite of the fact that
his death is an opportunity for the Iranians to slither out of what is
becoming, for them, an increasingly uncomfortable situation.
The lesson of the shah's demise should not go unnoticed. U. S. support
for our less-developed allies must not continue to erode. Ambiguity,
quibbling and lack of support, as occurred in Iran, will result in the United
States emerging with diminished stature, looking both impotent and
unreliable.
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Letters to the editor
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To the editor:
The editorial "Worth the
trouble?" The Tar Heel, July 24
contains a statement which shows an
ignorance of the ideology of this
country and the principles on which
it works so successfully: "But what
people tend to forget in this day of
spurious awareness is that we are
here to complain only because
someone else was drafted to fight for
that right." ."
On the contrary, we. are here to
complain because we have a
government based on the
develpment and education of the
individual, a belief in his inherent
worth and the acknowledgement
that through the use of law, both in
the courts and in the constant
attempt to make just laws, we will
produce the best life for all.
It is using faulty logic to connect
freedom and the draft Many
dictatorships have drafts and
standing armies, but the citizens are
not free to complain. Countries with
ready armies tend to use them as a
first and not a last resort, witness Idi
Amin's Uganda, Franco's Spain and
numerous Latin . American
countries.
In our own history, the use of the
army has often been for disgraceful
enterprises, from the crushing of the
Indian population to the Vietnam
War. The Central Intelligence
Agency, a branch of government not
subject to public scrutiny, in flagrant
disrespect of government by law,
used force to help overthrow a duly
elected Chilean Government. Russia
used its army to suppress
Czechoslovakia, Hungary and now
Afghanistan. '
. Posturing this late after the
; invasion of Af ghanistan is hot going
iion is
esYion
to scare the Russians; the only people
scared are the 19-and 20-year olds.
The type of people dissenting this
week are committed people who are
heartsick at having to start allover in
the fight against military solutions
to problems, at the task of educating
people to the fart that false
patriotism can destroy all that had
been accomplished in the past
Eleanor Kinnaird
Wilson Library
A beer a day
To the editor:
We would like to respond to your
recent article, "Beer drinking can be
beneficial to your health," (The Tar
Heel, July 10), in which the Center
for Alcohol Studies was quoted.
The information was quoted
accurately and represented recent
studies that indicate one or two
drinks a day can result in positive
health outcomes.
However, the article went on to
imply that more substantial
quantities of alcohol (a six-pack)
would result in similar positive
outcomes.
There is a significant and
potentially toxic difference between
one or two drinks per day and six
drinks per day. We would like to
suggest that more responsible
journalism about alcohol use and
abuse could be achieved without
communicating personal values that
promote excessive consumption.
John A. Ewing, M.D.
Kenneth C. Mills. Ph.D.
Center for Alcohol Studies
The Tar Heel
WriiersMaic Barnes, Kimberly Barnette-I lorto, Sammy Batten, Jeff Bowers, R.L.
Bynum, Thorn Daniels, John Dreschcr, Peggy Edwards, John Fish, Eric
Frederick, Susan Garrett, Lisa Goldarb, John Hinton, Martha Johnsen, Alison
Lynch, Bill Peschel, Yvette Ruffin, Spelia Russell, Aprille Shaffer, Todd Sobol,
Barrett Whitener, David Thompson, Jac Verstceg. Photographers: Flora
Garrison. Copy editors: Terri Garrard and Susan Lindcr. Business Manager:
Mark Kadlec. Advertising: Nancy McKenzie, manager, and Paula Brewer,
coordinator. SecretaryReceptionist: Linda Allrcd. Composition: University
Printing and Duplication Printing: The Hinton Press. Mebane.