NationStates Jolt Archive

SIC: KHUZESTAN PROVINCE, IRAN

They were called Hezb-e Tudeh-ye Iran. For those who do not speak Farsi, the Party of the Masses of Iran. Their foundation was declared in Khorramshahr, Khuzestan, Iran, in January of 1935. Their goal? To establish a Socialist Republic in Iran, similar to the one that had been established in neighboring Iraq/the UASR.
It would probably be little surprise to discover that the Tudeh Party and their leader, Malek Davoodi, were both deep in the SWPAK's pockets. However, it might be a bit more surprising to people that the Tudeh Party had actually been conceived completely by the UASR in the first place. Davoodi, while half-Arab, was Iranian-born himself, but he and his followers had been rallied by UASR intelligence operatives who were exactly where they needed to be to blend in while in Iran; Khuzestan.
al-Asadi back in Baghdad was planning a revolution for his Eastern neighbor. It was a well-kept secret, even within the SWPAK; only a certain committee within the Politburo, which was supposed to deal with foreign affairs, knew about the plans. Not even President al-Tikriti knew, although she was little more than a puppet for al-Asadi in the first place.
But, the revolution was not a snap your fingers and do the step kind of thing; it had to gain ground within all of Iran first. From Tabriz to Chah Bahar, the message of revolution had to spread across the land. Meanwhile, a part of the rifles made in the UASR's factories slipped across the border into Khuzestan, where the Tudeh Party was waiting for the message to spread...

A drop in the rates that the People's Democratic Liberation Army recruited, armed, and trained prospective soldiers coincided with a small amount of Iranians crossing the border into Iraq, whose immigration permits said that they were going into Iraq to drill oil with the UASR State Oil Company.
These two seemingly unrelated, harmless-looking events were in fact much more sinister than they appeared. These "oil workers" were really destined for clandestine training camps in the Eastern Iraqi Socialist Republic. Also destined to these training camps were experts in guerilla tactics from the Iraqi Revolution and the weapons that would have been going to arm soldiers that would have been training in these camps.
It would be in these camps that these Iranians would be fashioned into socialist guerillas with the know-how and the means to remove the Pahlavi monarchy from its seat of power in Tehran. The current number of Iranian communists who were with the cause was currently very small, and hadn't even crossed the border yet. But, as Davoodi and the civilian portion of the Tudeh Party began to spread the message Eastwards, that would change...

OUTSIDE BA'QUBAH, EASTERN IRAQI SR, UNITED ARAB SOCIALIST REPUBLIC

Seargeant Muslim al-Katib slowly looked over the fifty or so Iranian men who stood at attention in front of him. They all wore somewhat ragged sand-colored fatigues and all carried Mosin-Nagant rifles. They were older models, probably M1890/10s, instead of the PDLAGF-standard M1890/30. Behind them were two hastily constructed wooden barracks, where the all of them would be living during their four-month stay in the UASR. Most of them were probably from Khuzestan, but some might have been from somewhere else in the country. Davoodi was doing a good job gaining ground for the Tudehs in poorer areas of Iran.
"So, tell me, comrades," he said, in heavily accented Farsi, "In Iran, is it some weird Shi'a tradition to be late?"
No soldier dared look nervous or angry, but al-Katib was pretty sure some of them were.
"Because, back in Bahrain..." he continued, "If I was that sluggish to wake up, get my gun, and get out, the monarchists would have killed me a long time ago."
"Now, if I have to put up with this shit again..." al-Katib said, "I'm going to make the all of you, whether you were late or not, wish they had. You got it?"
"Yes, Comrade Seargeant!" the Iranians said in semi-unison.
"Damn right you've got it," al-Katib said, "You Iranians are lucky. Back when I was a revolutionary in Southern Bahrain, I was handed a rifle older than the ones you're holding and a manual on how to work it, which I lost three days later. You guys are getting four months training, along with a whole bunch of other Iranians! The revolution should be a cinch for all of you!"
"Now, step up to the firing range!" he said, "Let's see if you people know anything..."

This scene was mirrored all over Eastern Iraq. Many of these camps straddled the badly-defined areas of the Iranian border, where none of the Shah's troops could see what was going on. The Tudeh Party's spreading reputation had garnered about 750 Iranians to training camps just like this one, and the number was only increasing. After the four months training, the Iranians would "quit" their "jobs," go back to their hometowns in Iran, and get out recruiting for the Tudeh Party. Then, when the revolution was ready to kick off, Davoodi would be given a signal from Baghdad, and he would in turn forward that signal to the sleeper guerillas within Iran. Those guerillas would then put Davoodi, more accurately al-Asadi, into power...