Cyrus Niknia

 

Cyrus Niknia born (Nematullah Abdollahi) in 1937 was an Iranian imperial colonel under the last king of Iran Muhammad Reza Shah Pahlavi (1941-1979)

At the beginning of his career, Iran was a weakened country where he as officers was stationed for several years at the border. After the coup plotters killed the last Iraqi king, the situation in Iraq was very unstable and Iranian borders were attacked by Iraqi planes often. This continued until the Shah bought some fighter jets from the United States which enabled Iran to guard its borders.

  THE REVOLUTION THAT CHANCE EVERYTHING

By the late 1970s, Iran had become the strongest country in the Middle East. This was a great management. Thanks to the high rise in oil prices and the Shah's ambition to modernize Iran. In the book (The rise and fall of the Middle East), Arvin Niknia, the son of Cyrus Niknia, describes how it all turned into chaos. Cyrus Niknia was in the Imperial gurd's dinner room when a rebellious soldier who had joined the revolution managed to shoot the many soldiers and officers down in the dining room. Cyrus Niknia was the person who was allowed to count the dead and send the wounded to the hospital. In a video and in the book, the real number  and the event itself are told. It was General Rahimi who ordered Cyrus Niknia to take care of the task.

After the military declared itself neutral resulting in the collapse of the Shah's regime, Cyrus Niknia found himself in the lavizan barracks. Although the supporters of the revolution had promised that the millitary people could just take care of their jobs, they still stormed the lavizan and subsequently General Badrei was shot. Badrei was the supreme command of Lavizan Barracks. Cyrus Niknia managed to escape with some officers.

                              IRAN-IRAQ WAR 

After a few months, Cyrus Niknia is called back to serve the country. Many of the top generals had been executed. Cyrus Niknia is elected to work under General Hushang Attarian who had taken over the post after General Badrei. Attarian was a communist and strongly opposed to the staff of the Imperial Guards. However, he did not know the entire staff as the Imperial Gurads consisted of thousands of staff. When the war breaks out, Cyrus Niknia volunteered to fight for his country. During the war, Cyrus Niknia earned the title of chief of staff. Among other things, he worked with colonel Safavi and was commander of  Hussein Hassani Sa'di, who later for a time was military advisor to the Supreme Leader of Iran.

After Iraq was driven out of Iran, Cyrus Niknia chose to resign and soon after move to Europe.