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Iran : The Shah and the iranian nuclear project
22.11.2009

© IRAN-RESIST.ORG – October 1st, 2009 | Three years ago the amount of French investments in Iran totalled at 35 billion dollars. France often tops the list of Iran’s commercial partners. France thus, shows a certain resistance to apply adopted sanctions on Iran, and develops a slight complacent attitude towards the Mullah regime. There is a continuous effort to find excuses for the Mullahs’ acts, including the nuclear issue. That is why the French press often associates the actual Iranian nuclear program with the Shah of Iran.



In an interview published in Le Monde, Camille Grand, director of the Foundation of Strategic Research (Fondation pour la recherché stratégique) declared :

“We know that at the Shah’s time, Iran launched a vast nuclear program with a probable double objective, civil and military.”

It is often that we come about other “we know” affirmations of this kind. These supposed probabilities and certitudes allow to anchor the Mullahs’ nuclear ambitions in a historic context and therefore to underline the complicity of the West with Iran. A comparison is often made with Japan’s nuclear model, which insinuates that Tehran should have the right to enrich their own uranium as they wish. A prelude of the French wish to avoid sanctions and therefore not to put into peril their important investments in Iran.

Despite the fact that the Mullahs’ nuclear program is nothing but an unverified series of rumours and disinformation, it still remains that Camille Grand makes deductions based on altered facts. To reach his conclusions he made abstraction of three fundamental historic facts :

The first fact, mentioned but minimized by Mr Grand is that the Shah adhered the Non-Proliferation Treaty in 1968, at its creation. It is an important detail to underline the Shah’s participation in the creation of this Treaty.

The second fact, entirely eluded, is that the Shah, a relentless peacemaker of the region, the man who approached Begin and Sadat, was in 1974 the author of the first resolution for a denuclearized Middle East (See Document [1]).

The third fact, the Shah in 1974 invested 1 billion dollars in the Eurodif Project in order to benefit from 10% of the plant’s future nuclear fuel for Iran’s planned nuclear energy centrals, in signature with Europeans countries at the time.

These three facts combined deny any military penchants that the Shah could have had for Iran’s nuclear program. The Shah had no destabilization agenda for the region. On the contrary he made great efforts to approach his Israeli allies with his Egyptian and Turkish allies.

The Shah’s nuclear ambition was part of a vaster industrialization program for Iran and the absolute need for the country to diversify its energy sources. According to Pr Nosratollah Vahedi, one of the directors of the Shah’s nuclear program, now exiled in Germany, this diversification was not solely connected with nuclear energy. Iran was also studying the possibilities of exploiting solar or tidal energies. The Shah and such amendable persons as Pr Vahedi worked hard to make an industrialized and diversified Iran, not just dependant on its oil reserves for export. Iran has nearly 700 years of oil reserves, but the Shah’s ambition was to refine and transform this oil into petrochemical products within Iran. The Abadan refinery is an excellent example of his effort to push Iran into the 21st century it was at the time one of the largest and most modern refineries in the world [2]. These men worked with the major industrialized nations to make Iran a world industrial power. It is dishonest to compare these men who worked for noble causes in a relentless effort for Mid-East peace, with the thugs running Iran today and who have been creating havoc and chaos in the region for the past 30 years.

We hope that Mr Camille Grand was unaware of the resolution for a denuclearized Middle East initiated by the Shah, and now that he has been informed of its existence will take it into account and revise his false analysis.

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The french version of this article :
- Iran : Le Chah et le programme nucléaire iranien
- (1ER OCTOBRE 2009)

| Mots Clefs | Histoire : Mohammad-Reza Shah Pahlavi (le Chah) |
| Mots Clefs | Nucléaire : Eurodif |

| Mots Clefs | Nucléaire : Politique Nucléaire des mollahs |

| Mots Clefs | Zone géopolitique / Sphère d’influence : France |
| Mots Clefs | Nucléaire 2 : Expertises politiques, militaires ou nucléaires |
| Mots Clefs | Décideurs : Analystes & Experts |
| Mots Clefs | Auteurs & Textes : Le Monde (Marie-Claude Decamps, Corine Lesne...) |

| Mots Clefs | Enjeux : Sanctions unilatérales (en cours d’application ou à venir) |
| Mots Clefs | Enjeux : Sanctions (du Conseil de Sécurité) |

[1Resolution 3263 (XXIX) of December 9, 1974

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[2The oil refineries of Abadan | Before the revolution Iran possessed the largest oil refinery in the world in the city of Abadan. In 1977, this refinery had a capacity of 635000 barrels per day destined for exports. Iran had also 6 other refineries destined for domestic needs in Isfahan (200000 barrels per day), in Tabriz (80000 barrels per day), in Kermanshah (15000 barrels per day), in Shiraz (40000 bpd), and two in Tehran (125000 and 100000 bpd). Their total capacity was of 560000 barrels per day for a country then of 34m inhabitants, which gives one the importance of the Shah’s industrial projects for the nation. Today, the TOTAL refining capacity of Iran is 800000 bpd, which is only 66% of the total capacity in 1977. The war with Iraq combined with poor management and bad maintenance had their toll on Iran’s refining capacities these past 30 years.

Today with the double of inhabitants, the Iranian needs for gasoil and diesel is still of 560000 barrels per day, a proof of how low the country’s industrialization efforts have fallen. The needs for fuel on the other hand has reached 412000 barrels per day, which corresponds with the disproportionate explosion of the automobile park in detriment of a modern and effective public transportation program.