The New Confessions of an Economic Hit Man

by John Perkins

  His attitude, as well as the elegant setting, his Western clothes, and the presence of so many others in the restaurant, gave me a certain degree of comfort. I had become accustomed to people befriending me, like Rasy in Java and Fidel in Panama, and I accepted it as a compliment and an opportunity. I knew that I stood out from other Americans because I was in fact infatuated with the places I visited. I have found that people warm to you very quickly if you open your eyes, ears, and heart to their culture.

  Yamin asked if I knew about the Flowering Desert project.2 “The shah believes that our deserts were once fertile plains and lush forests. At least, that’s what he claims. During Alexander the Great’s reign, according to this theory, vast armies swept across these lands, traveling with millions of goats and sheep. The animals ate all the grass and other vegetation. The disappearance of these plants caused a drought, and eventually the entire region became a desert. Now all we have to do, or so the shah says, is plant millions upon millions of trees. After that — presto! — the rains will return and the desert will bloom again. Of course, in the process we will have to spend hundreds of millions of dollars.” He smiled condescendingly. “Companies like yours will reap huge profits.”

  “I take it you don’t believe in this theory.”

  “The desert is a symbol. Turning it green is about much more than agriculture.”

  Several waiters descended upon us with trays of beautifully presented Iranian food. Asking my permission first, Yamin proceeded to select an assortment from the various trays. Then he turned back to me.

  “A question for you, Mr. Perkins, if I might be so bold. What destroyed the cultures of your own native peoples, the Indians?”

  I responded that I felt there had been many factors, including greed and superior weapons.

  “Yes. True. All of that. But more than anything else, did it not come down to a destruction of the environment?” He went on to explain how, once forests and animals such as the buffalo are destroyed, and once people are moved onto reservations, the very foundations of cultures collapse.

  “You see, it is the same here,” he said. “The desert is our environment. The Flowering Desert project threatens nothing less than the destruction of our entire fabric. How can we allow this to happen?”

  I told him that it was my understanding that the whole idea behind the project came from his people. He responded with a cynical laugh, saying that the idea was planted in the shah’s mind by my own US government and that the shah was just a puppet of that government.

  “A true Persian would never permit such a thing,” Yamin said. Then he launched into a long dissertation about the relationship between his people — the Bedouin — and the desert. He emphasized that many urbanized Iranians take their vacations in the desert. They set up tents large enough for the entire family and spend a week or more living in them.

  “We — my people — are part of the desert. The people the shah claims to rule with that iron hand of his are not just of the desert. We are the desert.”

  After that, he told me stories about his personal experiences in the desert. When the evening was over, he escorted me back to the tiny door in the large wall. My taxi was waiting in the street outside. Yamin shook my hand and expressed his appreciation for the time I had spent with him. He again mentioned my young age and my openness, and the fact that my occupying such a position gave him hope for the future.

  “I am so glad to have had this time with a man like you.” He continued to hold my hand in his. “I would request of you only one more favor. I do not ask this lightly. I do it only because, after our time together tonight, I know it will be meaningful to you. You’ll gain a great deal from it.”

  “What is it I can do for you?”

  “I would like to introduce you to a dear friend of mine, a man who can tell you a great deal about our King of Kings. He may shock you, but I assure you that meeting him will be well worth your time.”

  CHAPTER 19

  Confessions of a Tortured Man

  Several days later, Yamin drove me out of Tehran, through a dusty and impoverished shantytown, along an old camel trail, and out to the edge of the desert. With the sun setting behind the city, he stopped his car at a cluster of tiny mud shacks surrounded by palm trees.

  “A very old oasis,” he explained, “dating back centuries before Marco Polo.” He preceded me to one of the shacks. “The man inside has a PhD from one of your most prestigious universities. For reasons that will soon be clear, he must remain nameless. You can call him Doc.”

  He knocked on the wooden door, and there was a muffled response. Yamin pushed the door open and led me inside. The tiny room was windowless and lit only by an oil lamp on a low table in one corner. As my eyes adjusted, I saw that the dirt floor was covered with Persian carpets. Then the shadowy outline of a man began to emerge. He was seated in front of the lamp in a way that kept his features hidden. I could tell only that he was bundled in blankets and was wearing something around his head. He sat in a wheelchair, and other than the table, this was the only piece of furniture in the room. Yamin motioned for me to sit on a carpet. He approached and gently embraced the man, speaking a few words in his ear, then returned and sat at my side.

  “I’ve told you about Mr. Perkins,” he said. “We’re both honored to have this opportunity to visit with you, sir.”

  “Mr. Perkins. You are welcome.” The voice, with barely any detectable accent, was low and hoarse. I found myself leaning forward into the small space between us as he said, “You see before you a broken man. I have not always been so. Once I was strong like you. I was a close and trusted adviser to the shah.” There was a long pause. “The Shah of Shahs, King of Kings.” His tone of voice sounded, I thought, more sad than angry.

  “I personally knew many of the world’s leaders. Eisenhower, Nixon, de Gaulle. They trusted me to help lead this country into the capitalist camp. The shah trusted me, and,” he made a sound that could have been a cough, but which I took for a laugh, “I trusted the shah. I believed his rhetoric. I was convinced that Iran would lead the Muslim world into a new epoch, that Persia would fulfill its promise. It seemed our destiny — the shah’s, mine, all of ours who carried out the mission we thought we had been born to fulfill.”

  The lump of blankets moved; the wheelchair made a wheezing noise and turned slightly. I could see the outline of the man’s face in profile, his shaggy beard, and — then it grabbed me — the flatness. He had no nose! I shuddered and stifled a gasp.

  “Not a pretty sight, would you say, ah, Mr. Perkins? Too bad you can’t see it in full light. It is truly grotesque.” Again there was the sound of choking laughter. “But as I’m sure you can appreciate, I must remain anonymous. Certainly, you could learn my identity if you tried, although you might find that I am dead. Officially, I no longer exist. Yet I trust you won’t try. You and your family are better off not knowing who I am. The arm of the shah and SAVAK reaches far.”

  The chair wheezed and returned to its original position. I felt a sense of relief, as though not seeing the profile somehow obliterated the violence that had been done. At the time, I did not know of this custom among some Islamic cultures. Individuals deemed to have brought dishonor or disgrace upon society or its leaders are punished by having their noses cut off. In this way, they are marked for life — as this man’s face clearly demonstrated.1

  “I’m sure, Mr. Perkins, you’re wondering why we invited you here.” Without waiting for my response, the man in the wheelchair continued, “You see, this man who calls himself the King of Kings is in reality satanic. His father was deposed by your CIA with — I hate to say it — my help, because he was said to be a Nazi collaborator. And then there was the Mossadegh calamity.2 Today, our shah is on the route to surpassing Hitler in the realms of evil. He does this with the full knowledge and support of your government.”

  “Why is that?” I asked.

  “Quite simple. He is your only real ally in the Middle East, and the indust
rial world rotates on the axle of oil that is the Middle East. Oh, you have Israel, of course, but that’s actually a liability to you, not an asset. And no oil there. Your politicians must placate the Jewish vote, must get their money to finance campaigns. So you’re stuck with Israel, I’m afraid. However, Iran is the key. Your oil companies — which carry even more power than the Jews — need us. You need our shah — or you think you do, just as you thought you needed South Vietnam’s corrupt leaders.”

  “Are you suggesting otherwise? Is Iran the equivalent to Vietnam?”

  “Potentially much worse. You see, this shah won’t last much longer. The Muslim world hates him. Not just the Arabs, but Muslims everywhere — Indonesia, the United States, but mostly right here, his own Persian people.” There was a thumping sound and I realized that he had struck the side of his chair. “He is evil! We Persians hate him.” Then silence. I could hear only his heavy breathing, as though the exertion had exhausted him.

  “Doc is very close to the mullahs,” Yamin said to me, his voice low and calm. “There is a huge undercurrent among the religious factions here, and it pervades most of our country, except for a handful of people in the commercial classes who benefit from the shah’s capitalism.”

  “I don’t doubt you,” I said. “But I must say that, during four visits here, I’ve seen nothing of it. Everyone I talk with seems to love the shah, to appreciate the economic upsurge.”

  “You don’t speak Farsi,” Yamin observed. “You hear only what is told to you by those men who benefit the most. The ones who have been educated in the States or in England end up working for the shah. Doc here is an exception — now.”

  He paused, seeming to ponder his next words. “It’s the same with your press. They only talk with the few who are his kin, his circle. Of course, for the most part, your press is also controlled by oil. So they hear what they want to hear and write what their advertisers want to read.”

  “Why are we telling you all this, Mr. Perkins?” Doc’s voice was even more hoarse than before, as if the effort of speaking and the emotions were draining what little energy the man had mustered for this meeting. “Because we’d like to convince you to get out and to persuade your company to stay away from our country. We want to warn you that although you may think you’ll make a great deal of money here, it’s an illusion. This government will not last.” Again, I heard the sound of his hand thudding against the chair. “And when it goes, the one that replaces it will have no sympathy for you and your kind.”

  “You’re saying we won’t be paid?”

  Doc broke down in a fit of coughing. Yamin went to him and rubbed his back. When the coughing ended, he spoke to Doc in Farsi and then came back to his seat.

  “We must end this conversation,” Yamin said to me. “In answer to your question: Yes, you will not be paid. You’ll do all that work, and when it comes time to collect your fees, the shah will be gone.”

  During the drive back, I asked Yamin why he and Doc wanted to spare MAIN the financial disaster he had predicted.

  “We’d be happy to see your company go bankrupt. However, we’d rather see you leave Iran. Just one company like yours, walking away, could start a trend. That’s what we’re hoping. You see, we don’t want a bloodbath here, but the shah must go, and we’ll try anything that will make that easier. So we pray to Allah that you’ll convince your Mr. Zambotti to get out while there is still time.”

  “Why me?”

  “I knew during our dinner together, when we spoke of the Flowering Desert project, that you were open to the truth. I knew that our information about you was correct — you are a man between two worlds, a man in the middle.”

  It made me wonder just how much he did know about me.

  CHAPTER 20

  The Fall of a King

  One evening in 1978, while I was sitting alone at the luxurious bar off the lobby of the Hotel InterContinental in Tehran, I felt a tap on my shoulder. I turned to see a heavyset Iranian in a business suit.

  “John Perkins! You don’t remember me?”

  The former soccer player had gained a lot of weight, but the voice was unmistakable. It was my old Middlebury friend Farhad, whom I had not seen in more than a decade. We embraced and sat down together. It quickly became obvious that he knew all about me and my work. It was equally obvious that he did not intend to share much about his own work. He told me that something “dangerous” was about to happen and that it was his responsibility to see to it that I left the country. At that point, I figured Farhad worked for the CIA or some other US agency.

  “Let’s get right to the point,” he said. “I’m flying to Rome tomorrow. My parents live there. I have a ticket for you on my flight.” He handed me an airline ticket. I did not doubt him for a moment. I had a job to do, but by now I figured part of that meant staying out of trouble — and staying alive.

  In Rome, we dined with Farhad’s parents. His father, the retired Iranian general who once stepped in front of a would-be assassin’s bullet to save the shah’s life, expressed disillusionment with his former boss. He said that during the past few years the shah had shown his true colors, his arrogance and greed. The general blamed US policy — particularly its backing of Israel, of corrupt leaders, and of despotic governments — for the hatred sweeping the Middle East, and he predicted that the shah would be gone within months.

  “You know,” he said, “you sowed the seeds of this rebellion in the early fifties, when you overthrew Mossadegh. You thought it very clever back then — as did I. But now it returns to haunt you — us.”1

  I was astounded by his pronouncements. I had heard something similar from Yamin and Doc, but coming from this man, it took on new significance. By this time, everyone knew of the existence of a fundamentalist Islamic underground, but we had convinced ourselves that the shah was immensely popular among the majority of his people and was therefore politically invincible. The general, however, was adamant.

  “Mark my words,” he said solemnly, “the shah’s fall will be only the beginning. It’s a preview of where the Muslim world is headed. Our rage has smoldered beneath the sands too long. Soon it will erupt.”

  Over dinner, I heard a great deal about Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini. Farhad and his father made it clear that they did not support his fanatical Shiism, but they were obviously impressed by the inroads he had made against the shah. They told me that this cleric, whose given name translated to “inspired of God,” was born into a family of dedicated Shiite scholars in a village near Tehran, in 1902.

  Khomeini had made it a point not to become involved in the Mossadegh–shah struggles of the early 1950s, but he actively opposed the shah in the 1960s, criticizing the ruler so adamantly that Khomeini was banished to Turkey, then to the Shiite holy city of An Najaf in Iraq, where he became the acknowledged leader of the opposition. He sent out letters, articles, and tape-recorded messages urging Iranians to rise up, overthrow the shah, and create a clerical state.

  Two days after that dinner with Farhad and his parents, news came out of Iran of bombings and riots. Ayatollah Khomeini and the mullahs had begun the offensive that would soon give them control. After that, things happened fast. The rage that Farhad’s father had described exploded in a violent Islamic uprising. The shah fled his country for Egypt in January 1979, and then, diagnosed with cancer, headed for a New York hospital.

  Followers of the Ayatollah Khomeini demanded his return. In November 1979, a militant Islamic mob seized the US Embassy in Tehran and held fifty-two American hostages for the next 444 days.2 President Carter attempted to negotiate the release of the hostages. When this failed, he authorized a military rescue mission, launched in April 1980. It was a disaster, and it turned out to be the hammer that would drive the final nail into Carter’s presidential coffin.

  Tremendous pressure, exerted by US commercial and political groups, forced the cancer-ridden shah to leave the United States. From the day he fled Tehran he had a difficult time finding sanctuary; all his
former friends shunned him. However, General Torrijos exhibited his customary compassion and offered the shah asylum in Panama, despite a personal dislike of the shah’s politics. The shah arrived and received sanctuary at the same resort where the new Panama Canal Treaty had so recently been negotiated.

  The mullahs demanded the shah’s return in exchange for the hostages held in the US Embassy. Those in Washington who had opposed the Canal treaty accused Torrijos of corruption and collusion with the shah, and of endangering the lives of US citizens. They, too, demanded that the shah be turned over to Ayatollah Khomeini. Ironically, until only a few weeks earlier, many of these same people had been the shah’s staunchest supporters. The once-proud King of Kings eventually returned to Egypt, where he died of cancer.

  Doc’s prediction came true. MAIN lost millions of dollars in Iran, as did many of our competitors. Carter lost his bid for reelection. The Reagan–Bush administration marched into Washington with promises to free the hostages, to bring down the mullahs, to return democracy to Iran, and to set straight the Panama Canal situation.

  For me, the lessons were irrefutable. Iran illustrated beyond any doubt that the United States was a nation laboring to deny the truth of its role in the world. It seemed incomprehensible that we could have been so misinformed about the shah and the tide of hatred that had surged against him. Even those of us in companies like MAIN, which had offices and personnel in the country, had not known. I felt certain that the NSA and the CIA must have seen what had been so obvious to Torrijos even as far back as my meeting with him in 1972, but that our own intelligence community had intentionally encouraged us all to close our eyes.

  CHAPTER 21

  Colombia: Keystone of Latin America

  Although Saudi Arabia, Iran, and Panama offered fascinating and disturbing studies, they also stood out as exceptions to the rule. Due to vast oil deposits in the first two and the Canal in the third, they did not fit the norm. Colombia’s situation was more typical, and MAIN was the designer and lead engineering firm on a huge hydroelectric project there.