James A. Bill
Essay
Fall
1984
A populist ferment is surging across Islam, from Yugoslavia and Morocco on the West to Indonesia, Malaysia, and the Philippines on the East. Fragmented in form, cohesive in ideology, this Islamic reassertion has been reflected in the 1978-79 Iranian revolution, the occupation of the Great Mosque in Mecca in Saudi Arabia in November 1979, the four-year war in Soviet-occupied Afghanistan, the assassination of President Anwar el-Sadat in Egypt in October 1981, and violent resistance in Lebanon through 1983 and 1984.
Essay
Winter
1978
In the turbulent world of the Middle East, there have been few islands of political stability that have been able to survive the storms of revolutionary change. Iran, with its political system directed by an absolute monarch and an enormous wealth of natural resources, has been widely viewed in the Western world as the most important such refuge in the area. American opinion leaders have long admired the sturdy consistency with which Iran has maintained its orderly existence, and in seeking a reliable partner and client state upon which to rest U.S. political and economic interests, American decision-makers chose to place their bets on Iran.
