My relatives from Iran left before the revolution and moved to Chicago but the general consensus from what I’ve heard was that Shah Pahlavi was wasteful, “stole” from the people, he lived in opulence with gold bathroom fixtures, Persian silk rugs, expensive pets while his people lived in poverty. He was seen as ruthless. Ayatollah Khomeini lived modestly and represented traditional Islamic values that many feared were being lost under Pahlavi’s regime.

A large majority of the Iranian society wanted to remove the Shah, but the educated middle classes from the urban centers wanted democracy while the lower classes, specially from the small villages outside the big cities, wanted Khomeini. For a time both camps competed for power, but the religious faction was far more brutal and ended crushing the other side.

> Marjanes parents say they didn't vote for the Islamic republic

She was from a very educated family from the middle class, so its very logical that she or anybody around her didn't voted for the Islamic republic. They were in the opposing camp.

If you want to know more, take a look at this documentary that explains the fighting for power that took place between the two factions of Iranian society that joined to overthrow the Shah.

I had no idea about it, but apparently that's what the web says.

It's a bit more complicated, and Khomeini was more the "last man standing" after the Shah had used support from the US and British foreign intelligence services to de-organize and effectively weaken the democratic/liberal rebels (which were city based).

The religiously motivated rebels, who had the majority of their support in the countryside, were not as vulnerable to such tactics and ended up being the strongest rebel group. As such Khomeini gradually managed to sweep up more and more rebel groups under his banner.

Probably whatever the US State Department told them to want. Lol

Here's a great YouTube video on the topic: https://youtube.com/watch?v=1cby_OiLxSs

Being a westerner but from an area of many military coups, I can understand about repression no matter where it comes from. I don’t really know what goes on in Iran, I hear and see many awful things. It’s up to the people to figure it out and act, no matter which way it goes, it will be bloody, that’s the price. I have worked with a few Iranians in guess what , engineering, construction, business in the US. They are very nice people.

Someone needs to train an AI with all the data of the skulls with confirmed pictures lying around. Then run that model on the skulls where pictures are missing/too old. Potential magic

So the first "war on Christmas" was really the result of religious zealotry? Ironic.

If you read the BOOK Generation Kill, they have good sort of example of this. (The TV Show is good but incomplete. It doesn’t explain whats happening as well)

But basically, on the initial invasion of Iraq, 2003, it LOOKS LIKE a Marine Corps Force Recon unit is being used as a traditional maneuver element, and (per the perspective of the book) being put in some needlessly risky positions, like obvious ambush routes.

Later the book sort of explains that the main force was on a “speed run”.

The Iraqi army was large, but notoriously disorganized and bad at command and control, SO the Allied war plan was speed. Overwhelm the Iraqi army and move too quickly for them to organize and coordinate defensive lines. Thus taking most of the country without a fight, and minimizing casualties all around.

Problem: slowing doen was not an option. Getting bogged down = giving the Iraqis a chance to regroup and dig in, snd them having to slug it out more often.

(In the words of Gen Mattis himself, in the prebrief, moving slow was a good way to land in an unpleasant convo with him. See: the Colonel he fired on the spot for getting stuck at a bridge)

So, SPEED

They were worried the Iraqis had a bunch of delaying ambushes set up that would bog down the main force

The Recon units were (according to the book) actually decoys, meant to trick the Iraqis into springing their ambushes early, so that your main force could just bypass them.

Hell of a tough task for the recon guys, BUT the whole idea dis that your toughest, best trained guys are the ones able to

A - lay down enough orce snd firepower for them to bluff an opponent into thinking they are a full sized unit

B - go around finding and baiting ambush positions, and actually survive doing it.

Paul Simon?

Important to note: at least in less movile eras, the vanguard could presictably be expected to encounter the enemy FIRST.

Even on a single fixed battlefield, thus their unit position in a battle formation, front of the group, right end of the group.

This was considered a very prestigious position for that reason.

In a fixed battle, the vanguard position would logically go to the “best” of your line units to strike the first blows.

But who that best unit would be could change. It could be decided by the leader of battle for that battle. There are plenty of examples of Viking or Celtic clans agreeing to fight together, but bitterly arguing over whose troops would have “the honor” of leading the formation. (To the point that there were even fights over the right to lead the following days actual fight)

On the other hand, some leaders might make a specific unit their vanguard unit, and continually maintain that unit as a vanguard.

To describe that in modern military terms, you could have 1st infantry, 2nd infantry, 3rd infantry, and you COULD select the best one of them at any given time to be your vanguard,

OR

You could say,

“We have an Army Ranger regiment. They’re going to take vanguard, because that’s what they’re for. We specifically select, train, and equip them that unit to be our vanguard unit. Thats why the get extra pay and special uniform markings and the prestige of being on the first-string-all-star team”

[removed]

As far as introductory works go on Greek mythology, but not in the academic sense, I'd say give Stephen Fry's works a go: Heroes and Mythos.

A lot of the stuff that Khomeini promised never ended up coming to fruition. It’s actually somewhat ironic as a lot of the tape recordings of his original speeches are now banned from being distributed since a lot of the stuff he promised he didn’t deliver.

The public wanted the Shah out, and while the Shah himself loved the country, his inner circle was corrupt and the focus was so much on modernizing that only major urban centers like Tehran and Shiraz were getting the focus, many rural areas were in such bad shape they weren’t even able to get everyday necessary supplies. Of course the corrupt circle was skimming off the top at the same time.

So you got a bunch of pissed off people from rural parts of the country, they are religious and you got Khomeini promising a bunch of government subsidies and well things start to turn sour. In addition, the Shah ended up getting his military upset at him in scenarios where he was using his military for stuff that upset his troops. For example, an Iranian helicopter pilot (who later died in the Iran-Iraq war and is a martyr considering the missions he volunteered for) interviewed later saying how he was trained to be a military helicopter pilot but during the 2500 year celebration of the Persian empire that the Shah organized at Persepolis, they had the pilot ferrying rice and cooking supplies back and forth from Tehran to Shiraz. Who knows if it’s true or not but again, people were upset, Shah was throwing lavish parties and households were hungry, Khomeini was promising free stuff in abundance, and here we are.

Depends on time and task.

To steal from wikipedia here, an example of a Middle ages vanguard (literally “advance guard”) would have been the ubits tasked with first up duties. So..

Scouts

Engineers (to clear obstructions from the road)

And even some messengers/diplomats (to reach towns first and basically say “ok, the rest of the army is coming up, do you guys want to just surrender now? Or do we have to bother setting up the whole siege thing? Come on. Save us all a headache and just surrender eh? We’ll give you a nice deal)

[removed]

[removed]

Just yesterday I visited his birthplace in Lisbon LOL

[removed]

[removed]

Not the other commenter but basically they want the previous ruler gone and replaced with someone else. Sometimes it turns out that the someone else is pretty shit. You don't want them, but you don't want the previous guy either. So you're stuck with someone you don't want, but you don't have the energy, willpower or economic stability to get rid of them too, at least for another couple of decades or until some nice foreign agency wants to install someone new, who you also probably won't like.

In democracy, this happens every four to six years with the revolution condensed into a couple of years of adverts, rallies, and the media telling you who you should or shouldn't like. Then you make your choice with the end goal that hopefully you got the least worst choice, and hopefully that guy you did have who you didn't like is gone. Or if the guy you didn't want gets in, you can complain for four years until you can try again. Meanwhile, you don't have any real power and which guy you choose is meaningless as they're all the same anyway.

He was portuguese though, but yeah still underwhelming

They weren’t fighting for democracy or any specific ideology, they just wanted a change of government because the Shah was did not have their best interest in mind and wasn’t doing a great job.

Now that’s a pedo face if I ever saw one!