Description
This paper examines Iran's domestic nuclear reappraisal, first under the Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi and then the Provisional Revolutionary Government of Iran, between 1977 and 1980. The paper posits that the financial crisis of 1977, rather than the 1979 revolution, was the impetus for Iran's decision to reassess its capital-intensive nuclear power programme, leading to the establishment of a high-level government commission which recommended a nuclear moratorium. In the final days of the Shah's reign, the imperial government cancelled construction of two French-built nuclear power plants in Iran. Contrary to conventional wisdom, Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini and the Provisional Revolutionary Government of Iran did not initially oppose nuclear power, but the seizure of the US Embassy in Tehran and ensuing hostage crisis made continuation of the Pahlavi-era programme all but impossible. Drawing on declassified US government documents and Persian-language primary sources, the paper sheds light on the nature and dynamics of Iran's nuclear decisionmaking during one of the most formative periods of modern Iran.
