A few days later, Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, an ascetic religious leader who had been forced into exile by the Shah, returned to a tumultuous welcome from crowds estimated at a million strong, shouting � ���"Death to the Shah.� �� � The new Iranian government began demanding that the Shah be returned to stand trial for human rights crimes and that he surrender his fortune, salted away in overseas accounts.
The new Iranian government also wanted Chase Manhattan to return Iranian assets, which Rockefeller put at more than $1 billion in 1978, although some estimates ran much higher. The withdrawal might have created a liquidity crisis for the bank which already was coping with financial troubles.
Ashraf's personal appeal put Rockefeller in what he described, with understatement, as � ���"an awkward position,� �� � according to his autobiography Memoirs.
� ���"There was nothing in my previous relationship with the Shah that made me feel a strong obligation to him,� �� � wrote the scion of the Rockefeller oil and banking fortune who had long prided himself in straddling the worlds of high finance and public policy.
� ���"He had never been a friend to whom I owed a personal debt, and neither was his relationship with the bank one that would justify my taking personal risks on his behalf. Indeed, there might be severe repercussions for Chase if the Iranian authorities determined that I was being too helpful to the Shah and his family.� �� �
Later that same day, March 23, 1979, after leaving Ashraf's residence, Rockefeller attended a dinner with Happy Rockefeller, the widow of his brother Nelson who had died two months earlier. Also at the dinner was former Secretary of State Kissinger, a long-time associate of the Rockefeller family.
Discussing the Shah's plight, Happy Rockefeller described her late husband's close friendship with the Shah, which had included a weekend stay with the Shah and his wife in Tehran in 1977. Happy said that when Nelson learned that the Shah would be forced to leave Iran, Nelson offered to pick out a new home for the Shah in the United States.
The dinner conversation also turned to what the participants saw as the dangerous precedent that President Carter was setting by turning his back on a prominent U.S. ally. What message of American timidity was being sent to other pro-U.S. leaders in the Middle East?
� ��˜Flying Dutchman'
The dinner led to a public campaign by Rockefeller � ��" along with Kissinger and former Chase Manhattan Bank Chairman John McCloy � ��" to find a suitable home in exile for the Shah. Country after country had closed their doors to the Shah as he began a humiliating odyssey as what Kissinger would call a modern-day � ���"Flying Dutchman,� �� � wandering in search of a safe harbor.
Rockefeller assigned his aide, Joseph Reed, � ���"to help [the Shah] in any way he could,� �� � including serving as the Shah's liaison to the U.S. government. McCloy, one of the so-called Wise Men of the post-World War II era, was representing Chase Manhattan as an attorney with Milbank, Tweed, Hadley and McCloy. One of his duties was to devise a financial strategy for staving off Iran's withdrawal of assets from the bank.
Rockefeller also pressed the Shah's case personally with Carter when the opportunity presented itself. On April 9, 1979, at the end of an Oval Office meeting on another topic, Rockefeller handed Carter a one-page memo describing the views of many foreign leaders disturbed by recent U.S. foreign policy actions, including Carter's treatment of the Shah.
� ���"With virtually no exceptions, the heads of state and other government leaders I saw expressed concern about United States foreign policy which they perceived to be vacillating and lacking in an understandable global approach,� �� � Rockefeller's memo read. � ���"They have questions about the dependability of the United States as a friend.� �� � An irritated Carter abruptly ended the meeting.
Despite the mounting pressure from influential quarters, Carter continued to rebuff appeals to let the Shah into the United States. So the Shah's influential friends began looking for alternative locations, asking other nations to shelter the ex-Iranian ruler.
Finally, arrangements were made for the Shah to fly to the Bahamas and � ��" when the Bahamian government turned out to be more interested in money than humanitarianism � ��" to Mexico.
� ���"With the Shah safely settled in Mexico, I had hopes that the need for my direct involvement on his behalf had ended,� �� � Rockefeller wrote in Memoirs. � ���"Henry [Kissinger] continued to publicly criticize the Carter administration for its overall management of the Iranian crisis and other aspects of its foreign policy, and Jack McCloy bombarded [Carter's Secretary of State] Cyrus Vance with letters demanding the Shah's admission to the United States.� �� �
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