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Mohammad Rezā Shāh found that foreign policy and royal spectacle added very little to his regime’s legitimacy. An elaborate coronation ceremony in 1967 and even more extravagant celebrations of monarchy in 1971 and 1975 earned him little credit in the courts of world or Iranian public opinion. Growing international criticism of Iran’s human rights record and state visits of Western leaders (most notably that of Jimmy Carter in late 1977) seemed to confirm his status as a tyrant and Western puppet.
