Jimmy Carter's engagement with Ruhollah Khomeini

In 2016, the BBC published a report which stated that the administration of United States President Jimmy Carter (1977–1981) had extensive contact with Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini and his entourage in the prelude to the Iranian Revolution of 1979. The report was based on "newly declassified US diplomatic cables". According to the report, Carter and his administration helped to discourage the Imperial Iranian army from launching a military coup against then-Prime Minister Bakhtiar in an effort to save the monarchy, and made efforts to find an accomodation between Khomeini and the military. According to the report, as mentioned by The Guardian, Khomeini in turn "went to great lengths to ensure the Americans would not jeopardise his plans to return to Iran - and even personally wrote to US officials" and assured them not to worry about their interests in Iran, particularly oil.

In his memoir, Answer to History, Mohammad Reza Shah claimed that the little-known Khomeini was able to ignite the 1963 demonstrations in Iran with help from foreign agents and that US President John F. Kennedy initially wanted him out of power before later changing his opinion of him. The Shah also claimed that President Jimmy Carter was another liberal president who reminded him of Kennedy and who wanted to interfere in Iran's affairs. In a year prior to the Revolution, Big Oil contracts with Iran were expiring; however, the companies never sought to renew the contracts with the Shah, which according to him was a blackmail threat. Ultimately the Shah claimed that the Americans and British colluded against him due to his 1973 nationalisation and oil price hike. The BBC report also showed a 1980 CIA analysis, which portrays Khomeini's attempts to contact the US as far back as 1963, during John F. Kennedy's administration.

Iran's political elite has dismissed these declassified reports. Ayatollah Khamenei stated that "it was based on fabricated documents". Ebrahim Yazdi (formerly a close associate of Khomeini) and Saeed Hajjarian viewed the BBC report with skepticism.