AHC: Avert the Iranian Revolution

With a POD after 1970, your challenge is to find a POD that can either keep the Shah in power by 1979 or at least resulting in a constitutional monarchy by then.
 
Also get rid of the one party for the nation experiment, that makes the white revolution A genuine attempt for good or bad at change, look phony!
 
I think the best way is for the Shah to listen to his advisers concerning what to do with the oil windfall from the '73 oil crisis. His advisers said most of the money should be saved because the windfall would not last forever. New industrialization projects should begin, but they had to be limited in order that 1) the economy not overheat and produce inflation, and 2) when oil prices declined the projects started could still be completed. The Shah overruled them. He felt he had a once in a lifetime chance to propel Iran into the ranks of developed nations before he'd died. The advisers ended up being right. Inflation skyrockedted, and by 1977 the Shah was forced to enact austerity measures to fight inflation which caused a different kind of problem. The economic difficulties in Iran really underminded the Shah's rule and turned some of his supporters against him.

If the economy didn't overheat and Iranians enjoyed good (or at least stable) economic times in the late seventies, he might have survived.

Of course, the other big problem is what to do with Khomeini. Without Khomeini, the Iranian Revolution might have produced a normal democracy, not an Islamic Republic.

The Shah made a lot of critical mistakes in the 1973-1978 period, probably fueled by a belief his oil wealth could do everything, and antagonizing ordinary Iranians by opulent displays. There's lot of room for improvement, but I think the only thing that is needed is for the Shah to limp past the late seventies before he dies so that constitutional monarchy can be established after he dies. I think the economy is the key thing here, but I admit it may not be enough.
 
I think the best way is for the Shah to listen to his advisers concerning what to do with the oil windfall from the '73 oil crisis. His advisers said most of the money should be saved because the windfall would not last forever. New industrialization projects should begin, but they had to be limited in order that 1) the economy not overheat and produce inflation, and 2) when oil prices declined the projects started could still be completed. The Shah overruled them. He felt he had a once in a lifetime chance to propel Iran into the ranks of developed nations before he'd died. The advisers ended up being right. Inflation skyrockedted, and by 1977 the Shah was forced to enact austerity measures to fight inflation which caused a different kind of problem. The economic difficulties in Iran really underminded the Shah's rule and turned some of his supporters against him.

If the economy didn't overheat and Iranians enjoyed good (or at least stable) economic times in the late seventies, he might have survived.

Of course, the other big problem is what to do with Khomeini. Without Khomeini, the Iranian Revolution might have produced a normal democracy, not an Islamic Republic.

The Shah made a lot of critical mistakes in the 1973-1978 period, probably fueled by a belief his oil wealth could do everything, and antagonizing ordinary Iranians by opulent displays. There's lot of room for improvement, but I think the only thing that is needed is for the Shah to limp past the late seventies before he dies so that constitutional monarchy can be established after he dies. I think the economy is the key thing here, but I admit it may not be enough.
Sounds cool, but I still would imagine that Khomeini would still be a influential force ITTL, just not leading the country.
 
Sounds cool, but I still would imagine that Khomeini would still be a influential force ITTL, just not leading the country.
Before his triumphant return after the revolution was basically already underway, Khomenei was in exile in Iraq (he had been since his role in opposing the white revolution). Khomenei was both hated and feared by the Shah and his government, because he was very popular with the masses and had supporters who were apparently willing to, for example, rise up in a multi-day riot that killed hundreds of people when he was imprisoned, or assassinate the Prime Minister of Iran for slapping the ayatollah.

My point is, I don't think it's possible for Khomenei to be influential and for Iran to have anything even vaguely to do with the Shah and his government at the same time. Khomenei also seems unlikely to want to play ball with the government; his actions before his exile, his writings before and during his exile, and also OTL actions after his exile all indicate that he's likely to oppose the Shah's government (which he considered hopelessly corrupt) and work towards a system of government based on Shariah law and Islamic jurisprudence. It's possible that he might be willing to cooperate with a sufficiently conservative and Islamic democratic government, but even that's questionable considering that he took a very dominant and domineering position ("I appoint the government") from the moment he landed in Tehran.

Even if he were to cooperate with such a government, it seems likely that such a situation would be very fragile and would sooner or later involve a Khomenei-ist coup or civil war. OTL we see that he is not super flexible when it comes to certain things (for example, he was basically pissed off at the entire white revolution's package of reforms, and was especially leery of anything that seemed to be Westernizing or liberalizing, or an attack on the power of the "uluma" class of Muslim scholars), and that his followers are both well organized and extremely willing to resort to violence in order to get what they think he wants.
 
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