' A MEAN-MINDED MINI-MEMOIR'

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP99-00498R000200010108-3
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 1
• Document Creation Date: December 20, 2016
• Document Release Date: March 22, 2007
• Sequence Number: 108
• Publication Date: September 18, 1980
• Content Type: OPEN SOURCE

STAT
Approved For Release 2007/03/22 : CIA-RDP99-00498Ra
ARTICLE .A.-,r rAP)
ON PAGE:` at_
,Philip Gi -yelin,`
,Consider how the stage was set in late
5'timmer. The 52 American hostages were
still locked up somewhere in Iran. Sensi-
tive initiatives were under way to secure
their release. Iranian militants were still "
threatening show trials and demanding,
among their. terms, American repent.
dice for a long history of deep intervention in Iran's internal affairs.
Enter (in print) 'W'illiam Sullivan, ca-
reer diplomat His final, thankless post
before retirement last year was that. of
?U:& ambassador in Tehran at the time of
}the decline and fall of the shah and the
.emergence of Ayatollah Khomeini as thei
!impenetrable father figure of a revolu-
-lion composed of many disparate parts.
....Does he practice a professional's dis-
creet restraint? No way. He charges,
head down, into the latest issue of For-
eign Policy magazine with a mean-.
52nded mini-n*moir. In it, he chroni-
cles in minute detail his and rival Car?
ter administrattgn strategies and mas-
ter plans for intervening in the internal
franian power struggle in the most inti-
mate and all-pervasive way. - ;
There is much loose talk of secret
cables and telephone conversations "in
the clear," of irreconcilable schemes
for military coups to save the shah or to
preempt the revolution. Out of it, Sulli-
van emerges, not surprisingly; as a dip-
lomatic paragon, farsighted, tough-
-minded, unfailingly right, The villain in
the piece is President Carter's national
security adviser, Zbigniew Brzezinski-
uniformly impulsive, uninformed, in-
discreet and wrong
Sullivan.'sees :what he. calls'. the
, "BrzezinsM. factor" ',in almost every-
thing. When Carter, on a deep-sea fish.,
ing trip, made the 'Irretrievable" mis-
take of canceling a mission by a U.S. of-
art
ini at Grit
ith Kh
,'
., p
has his teeth so firm! clamped on
~~'-
cal juncture, only Brzezin?ki was with. Y
THE WASHINGTON POST
18 September 1980
hire, Sullivan "pointedly reports. (Brie- Brzezinskci's ankle that he offers only
ziraski says the decision was approved: fragmentary glimpses of this administra-
bySecretary of State Vance.) ! tion-wide collapse in crisis management.
hit another point, Sullivan reports! Far more valuable evidence is avail-
that he replied unprintably to a relayedi able, however, in a cogent and, compre.
}
inciiry from Brzezinski about chancesi
h
'
for a military coup. (Brzezinski says a:
cotlp . was not even his- . first.. choice
among three on which the embassy'si
opinion was being solicited by a Nai
tio)aal Security Council subcommittee!
of -which Brzezinski-happened to be'
chairman.)
-
And that, we are supposed to believe,;
is how we lost Iran.
All right, I've oversimplified a bit:
But-that is pretty much the burden of: process put pretty much on 4UWUIUUC,
t S
p
liti
l t
lli
h
h
!
h
ca
rac
van
as c
t
e
o
u
osen;
with the loudest voice (more often than
to throw into the thick of the presiders
tial campaign. And the irony of it is:
thatit actually does shed quite a Iot of=
light on how things went so terribly
wrong for American interests in Iran='
though not, of course, the light that
Sullivan had in mind.
At some critical - points, Sullivan's
blinkered, self-serving account is over-
wrought or demonstrably inaccurate.
But for the same reasons that Sullivan
should-not have started the argument,
the administration's hands are tied in
trying to answer it.
In any case, Sullivan's strategy of eas-
ing the shah's departure, maneuvering
toehold the-armed forces together and
seeking accommodation with Khomeini,
not Brzezinski's) prevailing and the-
president's hand scarcely.' visible. De
fense Secretary Brown "never took a.
strong position during the crisis.". CI
ensive analysis of the aumuustratnon
s
handling of the Iranian crisis. Ina.re'cent i
issue of the Washington Quarterly, pub-
lished ? by the Georgetown 'University=
Center for Strategic and ' International
Studies, Michael A. Ledeen and William
H. Lewis painstakingly trace the develop--
ments leading up to the departure of the
shah and the triumphant return ? of
Khomeini from exile..
too:, cautious nosit:ons:"Supportive
messages from Brzezinski to the.shat
via Sullivan were simply not delivered.
An important -Sullivan proposar-I for
Washington's approval was not-even ac*
nnowledged:
At one point, Ledeen and Lewis do
suggest, in! extenuation, that perhaps
the crisis managers were trying to man-
age the unmanageable. "The.most im:1
portant part of the outcome of the-11ra-
nian crisis," they write, was "the-politi__
cal dynamics of the country itself
d f
-
was never really tested. Neither was the the critical role of the shalt and his as-!
Brzezinski strategy to save the shah (or a' sociates." }
front man for him) by manipulating the' ; But their conclusion-the one Sullivan
armed forces to suppress the revolution. _ never gets around to-is an indictment
That's the point: no clear course of ac-' of presidential management. With a
Lion was ever put to-a fair test. There Was, choice, between promoting gradual
a profound division among the presi evolution to a-`reformist government"
dent'
ri
i
l
d
i
d th
i
nc
pa
a
v
sers an
e pres
s p
: and encougi ofn
,.rang use the `Iro fist"
,
the administration "did neiti er.~.,,it; I
hoped for thebestandgottheworst." 1
y .