By Iris Harris
On Friday, Steven Kinzer, a New York Times correspondent and author of several books, was invited to speak on U.S. foreign policy regarding Iran as part of the International Scene Lecture Series, a host of programs launched by the Center for Civic Engagement, which is meant to educate students on international issues.
The lecture, which was given in the Cultural Center Theater, garnered such a large audience that in addition to filling every chair in the room, people sat in folding chairs behind the main seating, people stood behind the folding chairs and others sat along the walls on the side of the room.
Kinzer wrote “All the Shah’s Men: An American Coup and the Roots of Middle East Terror,” a book detailing how the CIA had overthrown the Iran government in 1953.
According to Kinzer, American-Iranian relations have been sculpted by the negative emotional connotations that are linked to the 1979 hostage crisis, where 52 American diplomats in the Iranian-American Embassy were taken hostage for 444 days.
“One of the big problems that the United States has with Iran now is that we’re so out of touch with them,” Kinzer said. He spoke of how the U.S. brought the Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlav to power in Iran in the early 1950s by overthrowing the democratically elected Prime Minister Mohammed Mosaddeq.
This ended Iran’s chance to maintain its once thriving democracy, according to Kinzer, and led the Middle East into a downward spiral of war, terrorism and anti-Western sentiment.
In the American news media today, Iran is being “prosecuted” for its continual enrichment of Uranium, one of the contents needed to develop nuclear weapons, Kinzer said. However, in the minds of many Iranians, Kinzer explained, the U.S. is making another attempt to keep Iran from developing as the British did in the early 20th century when they had complete and unyielding control of Iran’s oil industry.
“We’re not going to get Iran to make security concessions, until Iran feels safer,” Kinzer said. “Threatening Iran and trying to tell it that it can’t do things that dozens of other countries are freely allowed to do is only going to increase tension.”
Kinzer told the audience that violent interventions have gained American support because “our leaders tell us ‘We’re sacrificing ourselves only to help the poor, oppressed people in that country.'” However, this serves to increase anti-American sentiment.
“Now we have the spokespeople for those poor, oppressed victims telling us ‘don’t attack us, don’t bomb us, don’t liberate us, don’t send us money. Just keep your hands off,” Kinzer said.