It was a minor story in American newspapers when a riot broke out in the Iranian city of Tabriz in February 1978.

A UPI story that ran on page 11 of the Miami Herald carried this headline: "Calm Restored to Iranian Town After Riots."

"Armored cars and soldiers armed with machine guns Monday patrolled the streets of Tabriz, battered by a weekend of riots that left more than 125 persons dead or injured," it reported.

"Fighting broke out after leaders of an opposition religious group -- condemned by the government as 'Islamic Marxists' -- called for a general strike," it said. "Its members waged a 12-hour street battle with police Saturday and ventured back on the streets Sunday for another round of demonstrations."

A year later, revolutionary forces overthrew the regime of Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi, and the Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini became "supreme leader" of Iran's new Islamist regime. When Khomeini died in 1989, he was succeeded by Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.

On Feb. 17, Khamenei gave a speech celebrating the anniversary of the Tabriz riots -- and fatuously predicting the incapacitation of the U.S. military.

Eleven days later, when the United States and Israel launched a joint military action against Iran that resulted in Khamenei's death, the top posting on Khamenei's English-language website was a transcript of this speech. It ironically carried this headline: "Strongest military in the world may be struck so hard it cannot get up again."

"I will ... say a few words about the US," Khamenei said at the beginning of this speech, which included many words about the United States.

"It's a system that is truly in decline. It's an empire that's heading toward collapse," he said.

"As for the crumbling US empire, it truly is crumbling," he said. "They have problems in their economy, problems with their policies, and problems in their society."

"The problem we have........

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