By the end of that December, Iran had a written constitution and an elected Majlis. What happened next is the part that matters for anyone who believes tyranny in Iran is permanent. Mohammad Ali Shah, who inherited it in 1907, understood what every autocrat understands — that a parliament is not a rival institution but an existential verdict. Foreign guns, foreign command, domestic massacre: the formula has proved durable in Iran, and its practitioners have always claimed to be defending order. Sattar Khan famously refused the Russian consul’s offer of protection — the flag over his house would be Iran’s.