{"id":1257,"date":"2026-06-06T09:57:19","date_gmt":"2026-06-06T09:57:19","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/shahvand.org\/en\/?p=1257"},"modified":"2026-06-06T10:02:57","modified_gmt":"2026-06-06T10:02:57","slug":"hidden-history","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/shahvand.org\/en\/hidden-history\/","title":{"rendered":"Hidden History"},"content":{"rendered":"

This is Also My Narration of This Country\u2019s Hidden History<\/h2>\n
\n

“Manoto”<\/span>Interview with Parviz Sabeti <\/span>By Behrouz Fatali and Bahram Bigdeli<\/h2>\n<\/div>\n

<\/p>\n

\n
This is Also My Narration of This Country\u2019s Hidden History<\/em>
\nA Look at “Manoto”Interview with Parviz Sabeti By Behrouz Fatali and Bahram Bigdeli<\/em><\/div>\n
To save Iran from the Islamic Republic and establish the stability of its bright tomorrow, a difficult and uneven path lies ahead of us. On this perilous journey, if we do not activate our truth-seeking minds and remain unprepared to accept and learn from the realities\u2014good or bad\u2014that have occurred in the contemporary history of our homeland, we will not reach our destination.<\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n
\n
In the <\/span>“Parviz Sabeti”<\/span> documentary, we heard the account of an Iran-centered figure who served at the heart of the country\u2019s most secret security apparatus during the reign of the late Shah.<\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n
\n
Here, we will review the account of a leftist political activist from those distant years, who stood in the opposition to the Pahlavi government\u2014directly opposite the position of Parviz Sabeti.<\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n
\n
Bahram Bigdeli<\/span> was born in 1955 (1334 AP) and graduated in dentistry from the University of Tehran. He entered the University of Tehran in 1973 at the age of 18, and in 1980\u2014just two weeks before the start of the “Cultural Revolution,” which closed universities nationwide and led to the Islamic Republic’s ideological purging of “outsider” students\u2014he managed to obtain his degree. Completing this degree was made possible by the advice of an Armenian university professor to Bahram Bigdeli, out of the professor’s friendship with his father, Abolhassan Bigdeli, who had taught literature at Alborz High School for years prior to the 1979 (1357 AP) disaster. This professor, aware of the regime’s imminent plan to close the universities, shared it with a skeptical Bahram Bigdeli and advised him to finish and defend his doctoral thesis as soon as possible before it was too late.<\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n
\n
The beginning of Bahram Bigdeli\u2019s political activity was intertwined with the start of his university education. Just one month after entering the university, on the Shah\u2019s birthday on October 26, 1973 (4 Aban 1352 AP), he staged his first anti-government demonstration along with 14 other students. On that day, they gathered on the street in front of the main entrance of the University of Tehran for two to three minutes, chanting the slogan <\/span>“Until the death of this dictator, the movement continues,”<\/span> and then quickly dispersed.<\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n
\n
Bahram Bigdeli, whose early political activities leaned toward the Tudeh Party, was among the youths who began operating within the “fledgling Navid organization,” which served as the internal apparatus of the Tudeh Party. Following the 1979 disaster, and by order of Noureddin Kianouri\u2014the then-First Secretary of the Tudeh Party\u2014this organization remained active as the covert branch of the party, surviving until the collapse of the Tudeh Party’s network in 1983 (1362 AP).<\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n
\n
In the years following February 1979 until the crackdown on the Tudeh Party, Bahram Bigdeli openly opposed and confronted Kianouri\u2019s policies multiple times. In 1984, when the party\u2019s dependence on the former Soviet Union\u2014both logistically and from a security standpoint\u2014as well as its absolute unreformable nature became clear to him even after the devastating experience of the 1979 disaster, he left the party. From the summer of 1988 until today, he has been working tirelessly in the “Association for the Defense of Iranian Political Prisoners \u2013 Cologne,” an organization he co-founded.<\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n
\n
Our reference to the 1973\u20131980 period in Bahram Bigdeli\u2019s life is significant because the beginning and continuation of his political activity as a leftist student and youth are deeply woven into these years and their events. In other words, he was not only a witness to the emergence and evolution of the developments that led to the volatile revolutionary atmosphere and ultimately the 1979 disaster, but he also actively played a role in shaping those developments.<\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n
\n
In his account, Bahram Bigdeli reviews events spanning a crucial period of Iranian history as a real figure possessing an internal acuity sharpened by years of bitter and unpleasant experiences. With his unique perspective, he highlights the hidden realities and complex challenges with which Iranian society wrestled at the time.<\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n
\n
This authentic account, while bearing a clear identity, showcases Bahram Bigdeli\u2019s courage in accepting personal responsibility as a leftist political activist during the Shah’s era, and it is precisely for this reason that it is admirable. Perhaps if other authentic accounts of this nature had been raised courageously and at the right time, the inversion of major events like August 19, 1953 (28 Mordad), or the attribution of incidents like the deaths of Samad Behrangi and Gholamreza Takhti to SAVAK would not have been cemented as actual history\u2014lies that destructively influenced the political climate of Iran for years.<\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n
\n
There is no doubt that with his taboo-breaking narrative, Bahram Bigdeli will pioneer a path for other eyewitnesses from the innermost layers of the opposition movements against the Pahlavi regime. Driven by love for their homeland and the goal of saving it from the brink of collapse, they will step forward, and through their true accounts, expose the false interpretations and prevalent inverted perceptions of that era. Such enlightening narratives will not only assist our deeper understanding and perception of contemporary Iranian history but will also pave the necessary ground for achieving a bright future for our country.<\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n
\n
Bahram Bigdeli\u2019s Narrative<\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n
\n
In any country, transmitting historical experiences from one generation to the next is an inevitable necessity to anchor a nation’s historical memory and avoid repeating past errors.<\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n
\n
In the “Parviz Sabeti” documentary, we witnessed Mr. Sabeti narrating the events of the Pahlavi era and the role he played in them. The same responsibility weighs heavily on the shoulders of us, the other social actors\u2014large and small\u2014of that time, to critique and review the events of that era based on gathered information and experiences, and to tell our own story.<\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n
\n
If the agony of “thinking with one’s own brain” is absent, even the most obvious truths will not be welcomed or accepted by us. It is for this reason that blind, conformist group attachments must be considered the greatest barrier preventing us from seeking the truth, understanding it, and having the courage to express it.<\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n
\n
Let me begin with the annual meeting of Republicans that was recently held in the city of Cologne. Let us note carefully that this meeting took place under conditions where the face of the world has completely changed compared to 50 years ago:<\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n
\n
The Soviet Union has been destroyed, the specter of communism has vanished from the world, and the countries surrounding us have each, in one way or another, slipped into instability, chaos, and abandonment. Meanwhile, our homeland\u2014though there is no longer any trace of the clergy’s spiritual influence among our people\u2014struggles half-dead, drowned in crisis, on the brink of collapse, trapped under the insane rule of <\/span>Ummah<\/span>-centric internationalists.<\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n
\n
At the head of this meeting, we see a few familiar faces:<\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n
\n
One of these faces is Taghi Rahmani, who seeks the rule of Islamic laws by religious modernists in a future Iran. Look closely! In Iran <\/span>after<\/span> the overthrow of the Islamic Republic! Someone who has said that we will strive in post-Islamic Republic Iran to win the majority vote of the people to implement our proposed Islamic laws. If it doesn’t work, we will try again until we finally succeed! Forty-five years of Islamic rule, with all its disastrous effects on our country, have passed, and he is still thinking about Islamizing society!<\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n
\n
Another face is Mohammad Reza Nikfar, one of the leftist theorists. It is enough to see his separatist and anti-Iranian intentions on the “Radio Zamaneh” website (where he serves as editor-in-chief) in an image published mid-way through a report on this gathering. An image almost entirely covered by this slogan:<\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n
\n
“For freedom… The Democratic Alliance of Nations in Iran”!<\/span><\/div>\n<\/blockquote>\n
\n
Therefore, his agenda is also clear!<\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n
\n
The third face is Hassan Shariatmadari, who is also satisfied with nothing less than the “nations” of Iran!<\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n
\n
The next face is Mehdi Fatapour. Someone who, like Taghi Rahmani, Mohammad Reza Nikfar, and Hassan Shariatmadari, still has not broken away from his past outlook.<\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n
\n
Mehdi Fatapour\u2019s wife, Maryam Satvat, is also seen among the participants in this meeting. She, too, still finds the past guerrilla actions of herself and her comrades sweet, and her irreconcilable enmity with the Shah and the Pahlavi government has not diminished one bit. Yet, safely and in good health, she travels to the very Iran ruled by the Islamic Republic!<\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n
\n
By naming these few political figures, we get a measure of the entire group of participants in this meeting:<\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n
\n
Survivors of the same breed whose anti-national and anti-homeland goals and actions created the 1979 disaster! Survivors who still remain, in various ways, within the molds of their “1979 mindset” and continue down the same path that was doomed to failure from the start.<\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n
\n
What Was the Reason for the Prosperous Outcomes of Some Dictatorial Countries Contemporary with the Shah’s Government?<\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n
\n
To answer this question, we must look at the dictatorships contemporary with the Pahlavi government in South America, the Philippines, Indonesia, and even Spain, and examine their opposition, comparing them to the Shah and his opposition.<\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n
\n
First and foremost, what we find in this comparison is that the policies of the dictators of these countries and the policies of the Shah were entirely identical along two fundamental axes. Both they and the Shah:<\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n
    \n
  1. \n
    Prevented their countries from falling into the abyss of the hell of communism.<\/span><\/div>\n<\/li>\n
  2. \n
    Maintained close, friendly relations with the United States.<\/span><\/div>\n<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n
    \n
    However, when we evaluate the services rendered by these dictators on one hand, and the Shah on the other for their countries, we see that their services are not comparable to the Shah’s at all.<\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n
    \n
    One must also not lose sight of the fact that none of these countries ever faced the threat of religious reactionism, nor the threat of a neighbor with a long shared border named the Soviet Union!<\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n
    \n
    The point worth reflecting upon is that after the fall of these dictatorships, the politicians in the opposition of those countries proved that they were genuinely seeking democracy. In what sense? In the sense that today, looking back, they can call their former governments dictatorships, yet take pride that they themselves were genuinely pursuing democracy from the beginning. Why? Because despite the close friendly relations their countries’ dictators had with the US, none of them pursued hostility with America after achieving democracy, and none of them engaged in vengeance or asset confiscations after accepting democracy. They did not execute officials of the former regime and managed to strive toward their country’s progress without establishing another dictatorship.<\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n
    \n
    Now let us see how the forces in the Shah’s opposition handled these two concepts of progress and democracy:<\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n
      \n
    1. \n
      Unlike the opposition in South American countries, the Philippines, Indonesia, and Spain, the Shah\u2019s opposition fundamentally had no understanding of “progress” and the “goal of progress,” which was to reach a society on par with Western societies. On the contrary, their goal was either a society modeled on the current Islamic-communist hybrid created in Iran, or building a socialist society, mostly with the help of the Soviet Union\u2014which itself was a backward country and technically had nothing to offer other nations. Consequently, the country the Shah\u2019s opposition wanted would have leaned toward a backward superpower, rather than toward progress and the free world. A country that technically had to remain backward forever.<\/span><\/div>\n<\/li>\n
    2. \n
      The Shah\u2019s opposition not only lacked belief in the concepts of democracy, liberalism, and human rights, but considered them insults.<\/span><\/div>\n<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n
      \n
      Unquestionably, if 45 years ago the governance of our country had fallen into the hands of any of the other forces in the Shah\u2019s opposition instead of the clerics and the “national-religious” figures, given the shared characteristics they all possessed\u2014including:<\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n