| Summary/Abstract |
On the evening of April 12, 1962, U.S. President John F. Kennedy and First Lady Jacqueline Kennedy hosted Mohammad Reza Shah and Empress Farah Pahlavi of Iran at the White House for a glamorous dinner and reception. The visit constituted the first meeting between the President and the Shah, who had single-handedly held the reins of Iran since the U.S.-sponsored coup of 1953. Much was at stake. Although Iran was a staunch U.S. ally, the Democratic President and the Shah disagreed sharply on the road the country should take. Kennedy had come to power through idealistic rhetoric that considered human rights and democratization a significant part of modernization and a practical way of averting radical left-wing revolutions.1 The Shah, the autocratic leader of an increasingly oil-rich nation, believed socioeconomic development in Iran had to precede democratization to prevent destabilization. He had set out on the visit to convince the president and the U.S. public that Iran’s progress meant royal leadership—not U.S.-style democracy.
|