This issue begins with an article by Jeremy Friedman discussing how the Communist Party of the Soviet Union (CPSU) and the East German Socialist Unity Party (SED) responded to the revolutionary turmoil in Iran in 1979. Both the CPSU and the SED had long-standing ties with the Iranian Tudeh (Communist) Party, which they funded and supported. Because of ideological misconceptions connected with Soviet Marxist-Leninist doctrine and erroneous lessons derived from the overthrow of Salvador Allende's far-left government in Chile in 1973, the Tudeh supported the Islamist clerics led by Ayatollah Khomeini both during and after the overthrow of the Shah of Iran in February 1979. Even after it was clear that the Islamists wanted to impose a fundamentalist Islamic regime in Iran, the Tudeh maintained its support for Khomeini, much to its own detriment. This dynamic helps to explain why the CPSU and SED for a considerable while backed forces...

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