ON SAVAK’S SHADOW: WHY IRAN REJECTS THE RETURN OF THE SHAH’S SECRET POLICE

The recent spectacle in Regensburg, Germany, where supporters of Reza Pahlavi, son of the hated Shah of Iran, marched with banners and T-shirts bearing the insignia of SAVAK, should alarm anyone who values democracy, human rights, and historical memory. Displaying the emblem of the Shah’s secret police represents far more than nostalgia. It signals approval for one of the most feared instruments of repression in modern Iranian history.

For millions of Iranians, SAVAK symbolized terror. Established in 1957 under Mohammad Reza Pahlavi, the organization became the backbone of the Shah’s dictatorship. Armed with sweeping powers and trained with foreign intelligence assistance, SAVAK infiltrated universities, labor unions, newspapers, political parties, and even private gatherings. By the 1970s, it had evolved into a vast machinery of surveillance, intimidation, and torture that touched nearly every politically conscious Iranian family.

Its victims came from every corner of society. Liberals, leftists, nationalists, religious dissidents, intellectuals, students, and members of the People’s Mojahedin Organization of Iran/Mujahedin-e Khalq (PMOI/MEK). Amnesty International and numerous historians documented horrifying methods of torture linked to SAVAK interrogators, including electric shocks, whipping with cables, nail extraction, savage beatings, mock executions, and psychological torment. Prisoners described being burned on metal frames and forced into devices designed to maximize pain and humiliation. One of the regime’s darkest crimes occurred in April 1975, when political prisoners were executed near Evin Prison after being removed from their cells in handcuffs and blindfolds.

Such atrocities permanently stained the monarchy and shattered its moral legitimacy. SAVAK stood at the center of the anger that exploded during the 1979 revolution. Many Western observers portray that revolution solely as a religious uprising led by Ayatollah Khomeini. That interpretation ignores the immense rage generated by years of political repression. Under the Shah, peaceful dissent faced brutal suppression. Political parties disappeared or became meaningless. Independent journalism suffocated. Elections carried zero credibility. Torture became institutionalized. In such an atmosphere, opposition movements naturally radicalized. Countless Iranians who later despised clerical rule still joined the anti-Shah movement because they believed no nation could endure a secret police apparatus like SAVAK forever. The Shah possessed military strength, oil wealth, and foreign backing, yet his regime lacked public legitimacy. SAVAK embodied that crisis of legitimacy more clearly than any speech or ideology ever could.

That reality makes today’s rehabilitation of SAVAK deeply disturbing. How did Iran arrive at a moment where supporters of Reza Pahlavi believe it is socially acceptable, even politically useful, to wear shirts displaying the SAVAK emblem? How can symbols associated with torture chambers and political executions appear in democratic Europe as if they represent freedom? Part of the answer lies in historical amnesia. Another part lies in deliberate political marketing. Over recent years, segments of the monarchist movement have tried to recast the Pahlavi dictatorship as an era of stability, prosperity, and national pride. Within this revisionist narrative, SAVAK receives treatment as a patriotic security organization rather than a machinery of repression.

That whitewashing has become increasingly explicit. During protests in recent years, royalist activists openly displayed images of Parviz Sabeti, one of SAVAK’s most infamous commanders. Sabeti ranked among the most powerful figures in late Pahlavi Iran and oversaw the organization’s internal security operations. Former prisoners and historians repeatedly connected his name with systematic torture and political repression.

Today, Sabeti reportedly lives comfortably in the United States after decades spent away from public attention. Yet his past continues to follow him. Former Iranian political prisoners recently filed a multi-million-dollar civil lawsuit against him in a U.S. federal court, accusing him of overseeing torture and crimes against dissidents during the Shah’s reign. The lawsuit seeks roughly $225 million in damages and argues that Sabeti exercised command responsibility over interrogators and torturers. The transformation of such a figure into a celebrated icon within sections of the monarchist movement reveals a dangerous trend – the normalization of authoritarianism under nationalist slogans.

Equally troubling are Reza Pahlavi’s own statements. Rather than clearly confronting the abuses carried out under the monarchy, he frequently expresses pride in his father’s rule. In interviews, he has brushed aside questions concerning repression during the Shah’s era as fixation on old history. More ominously, he has openly acknowledged maintaining contact with senior commanders of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), arguing that their cooperation would prove necessary to maintain order after the fall of the current regime.

That admission raises an unavoidable question – what kind of future stands under construction for Iran? If the same security mentality survives through alliances with elements of the IRGC today, many Iranians fear they face a choice between two authoritarian systems rather than genuine democratic transformation. A democratic republic requires accountability, pluralism, civilian rule, and respect for human rights. Secret police networks, military coercion, and hereditary power point in the opposite direction.

Modern Iranian history reveals a tragic cycle. The Shah’s repression created fertile ground for Khomeini’s rise. The brutality of the Islamic Republic now fuels nostalgia for the monarchy. Yet nostalgia cannot erase memory. No country seeking liberty can romanticize its torturers. Germany absorbed this lesson after World War II. Any attempt to rehabilitate the Gestapo or parade its insignia in public would provoke national outrage because those symbols represent fear, cruelty, and state terror.

Restoring SAVAK in a post-mullah Iran would carry the same moral meaning. Such a project would resurrect the very institution that helped destroy Iran’s democratic development decades ago. Iran needs neither recycled dictatorship wrapped in nationalism nor religious tyranny cloaked in ideology. The Iranian people deserve a democratic republic grounded in accountability, human rights, political pluralism, and the rule of law. Any movement that glorifies SAVAK, embraces its commanders, or relies upon alliances with repressive military structures betrays that democratic promise long before reaching power.