Now, Another Power Struggle

Khomeini hugs Arafat and straight-arms the leftists

After the revolution, another struggle for power. That this would be the next chapter in Iran's political saga grew ever more possible last week as the country's new leaders struggled to consolidate their tenuous control over their chaotic land. In many ways, the immediate challenge facing the regime headed by Prime Minister Mehdi Bazargan was reflected at a rally staged at the Tehran University soccer stadium by disgruntled leftist groups that want a bigger voice in the post-Shah government than they have so far been allowed. Under the banner of the Marxist fedayeen, an overflow crowd of 60,000 shouted "Down with U.S. imperialism!" and other slogans. In a feeble attempt at rhetorical counterattack, a few hundred supporters of Bazargan and Ayatullah Khomeini charged in chanting "Islam is protecting you. Islam has saved Iran."

Though verbally outgunned at the stadium, the Bazargan regime counted the rally as a victory in its struggle to bring order to Iran. Upset by the fact that no outspoken leftists have been appointed to Bazargan's 17-member Cabinet, fedayeen leaders called a midweek protest march by "all those who are concerned that the blood of martyrs has been spilled for nothing." Khomeini, determined to curb freelance violence of the type that resulted in the assault on the U.S. embassy two weeks ago, denounced the leftists as "non-Muslims" who "are at war with the philosophical beliefs of Islam." Cowed by the Shi'ite leader's vehemence, the leftists called off the march, which would have violated a ban on demonstrations, and substituted the soccer-stadium rally. Though Tehran University is a center of leftist activism, the meeting turned out to be comparatively tame.

Meanwhile, the Bazargan regime moved quickly to try to assert its authority. In the northwest, near Iran's border with Iraq, Khomeini loyalists battled with members of Iran's Kurdish minority, who hoped that the upheaval might help them realize their longtime dream of breaking away from Tehran's control. Other revolutionary groups disarmed the few military units still loyal to the Shah. In Tehran, shopkeepers happily set out red and pink carnations to celebrate the reopening of the city's long shuttered bazaar district, and children marched off to classes in newly reopened schools.

Economically, the regime's top priority was the resumption of Iran's oil exports, which have been shut off for two months. Although this has posed problems for the industrial countries that consume Iranian oil, for Iran itself the shutdown has been an economic disaster. Conceding that the state of his country's finances made him "shudder," Bazargan warned last week that "if our oil is not exported, we will have no money, and the revolution will be wiped out on the spot."

Bazargan aims to increase Iran's oil production from its current rate of 700,000 bbl. a day, which is barely enough to provide for the country's needs, to 3.5 million bbl. in a few months. Though that is scarcely more than half Iran's pre-revolution output, it is a reasonably ambitious target, especially since the country's oilworkers have strong leftist sentiments.

Another task Bazargan faces is securing for his provisional regime the power still held by the shadowy Islamic Revolutionary Council. This secretive group, which is believed to be composed of high-ranking Shi'ite leaders and a few civilians and led by Khomeini, amounts to a parallel government, one that has not always bothered to let Bazargan know what it is doing. The Prime Minister was embarrassed last week to learn that without his knowledge, four more of the Shah's generals had been executed after being convicted in a secret tribunal authorized by the council. Worse yet, from Bazargan's viewpoint, the 10,000 to 15,000 heavily armed mojahedeen, who profess allegiance to the council, pay no heed to his government's commands. To curtail the council's power, Bazargan has introduced legislation to create a system of revolutionary courts to take over further political trials. He also ordered the newly appointed Minister of National Defense, Ahmad Madani, and Armed Forces Chief of Staff Mohammed Qarani to set up a new national guard. Its ultimate task: disarming both the Marxist fedayeen and the Islamic mojahedeen.

It may have been to win the allegiance of the fedayeen and other leftist groups that Iran's new leaders last week staged their first diplomatic extravaganza: the welcoming to Tehran of Palestine Liberation Organization Leader Yasser Arafat. The P.L.O. trained many of Khomeini's fighters, and Arafat was anxious to cash in on the debt. Hailing the obvious, Arafat happily declared after his arrival on a Syrian jet that Khomeini's triumph had "turned upside down" the Middle East political equations (see following story). Despite Arafat's euphoria--"Today Iran, tomorrow Palestine," he declared at a news conference--his hosts seemed to be as eager to use Arafat as he was to use them.

Khomeini's purpose in so lavishly welcoming Arafat could have been in part to outflank his leftist opposition in Iran by demonstrating his solidarity with the Palestinians. That view was supported by Chief of Staff Qarani's assurances that Iran would abide by its agreement with the U.S. not to share its arsenal of Amerlean-supplied planes, missiles and other weapons with any other state. Qarani predicted that foreign military advisers, and perhaps some technicians from the U.S., would soon be invited to return to Iran.

Acceptances of any such invitation might come slowly. Carrying whatever possessions they could stuff into suitcases, 3,636 U.S. citizens left aboard chartered evacuation flights to Europe and the U.S. before the emergency fly-out was ended at midweek.

The American exodus generated a number of implausible episodes of confusion and enterprise. One of the most unlikely involved William Gaylord and Paul Chiapparoni, employees of Electronic Data Systems, Inc., a Dallas-based computer company headed by a flamboyant patriot-chairman, H. Ross Perot. Arrested just before New Year's Day, the two men had been clapped into Tehran's Qasr jail, which then housed 11,000 prisoners. Unable to secure the men's release through State Department channels,

Perot, who once tried to deliver Christmas presents and dinners to American P.O.W.s in North Viet Nam, says that he took matters into his own hands. As Perot tells the story, former Green Beret Colonel Arthur ("Bull") Simons, leader of the daring but unsuccessful raid on the Son Tay P.O.W. camp in North Viet Nam in 1970, agreed to lead a band of 14 volunteer commandos in an assault on the prison. After deciding that the unit was too small for the job, claims Perot, he arranged for a mob to do the job. There was indeed a prison break, and the two Americans escaped with thousands of other prisoners. They made their way overland to Turkey with the commandos, and from there flew to the U.S. Said Chiapparoni when he arrived in Dallas last week: "I always wanted to work with a company that cares about its people."

Watching Iran's turmoil from thousands of miles away in Morocco was one very interested observer: deposed Shah Mohammed Reza Pahlavi. Iran's government, declared Foreign Minister Karim Sanjabi, would press for the Shah's extradition "until there is no place he can go except for Israel or South Africa." Indeed, the Shah's sojourn in Morocco may soon end. Last week his host, King Hassan II, formally recognized the Bazargan government. The crew of the Shah's royal 707 jet flew the plane, complete with its gold-plated bathroom fixtures, back to Iran. "If anyone offers you a job, take it," the gloomy monarch reportedly advised his dwindling entourage last week.

Though it was scarcely any comfort for the Shah, a number of observers in Middle Eastern capitals now were beginning to wonder about the life expectancy of the Bazargan government. In Cairo, Egyptian officials were speculating that the Tehran regime might hang on for six months, but then would be toppled by leftists. Only time and events will tell whether Iranians can be persuaded that their new rulers have indeed "saved Iran." -

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