Would Iran have computers at the airport in 1980?!

To set the record straight, yes, they had computers in the airport in Iran in 1980. Unknown to the ignorant masses, Iran was the most developed nation in the middle east at that time. The US and Britain had dumped billions of dollars into Iran, and Iran had billions of its own from oil. Until the US put the Ayatollah in power in late 1979, Iran was very westernized and was even seeking nuclear capability, which was the catalyst that launched the secret effort by the US to oust the Shah.

Terminals is probably the most accurate term. Yes, mainframe terminals like this were in widespread use by the early '70s. Even in countries like Iran, where larger operations like airports were probably the only ones to have them.

They weren't that backwards. Also, at the time the story takes place, Iran didn't get worse and worse. Once they got into the war with Iraq, it got to a situation like in Not Without My Daughter.

They were forced to install such a system. Before that, they still employed scribes (you know, the ones scratching everything on clay tablets, then the tablets went to the furnace to make the registry "permanent", by means of overheating but not to a breaking point, and finally they stored the tablets in the archive is Sous...Tehran) but those idiots started going union and asking for things like health plans, dental coverage, pension systems so they had to lay them all off and replace them with a state of the art computer system imported from....wait for it...the US! (or was it UK? Maybe Japan? Italy? Germany?) Grrrr, with so many potential sellers, Iran COULD have a computer system at its capital's airport by 1980, if they could come with enough money to buy one. (...wait, what was that? OIL money? Oh, darn!!)



Cute and cuddly boyz!!

You are just a spring chicken so you wouldn't know that despite the Shah's dreaded Savak, Iran was a modern civilised country. It still is to some extent despite the privation and cutting off from the world due to US sanctions.
Of course the airlines and Immigration control would have computers.


In his cloak of words strode the ringmaster

I don't know why you would think that.

As others have pointed out before me, Iran was not as backward as you seem to think or have been led to believe.

We were posted to the coast, north of Tehran, for a year. We were just a few of many Westerners supplying support to their modern infrastructure. In this case it was teaching at their Naval bases.

Our neighbours were a varying mix of North American, Europeans and locals.

To my mind, Iran was quite possibly more advanced than some other countries in Western Europe at the time.

We also all recall how incredibly friendly and accommodating the locals were, regardless of politics at the time.

Sure, a year is not a lifetime nor very long by any stretch, but it does give you a better feel than just through hearsay and propaganda.

Backwards? I don't think so.


(PS. It took me a while to get round to seeing this movie, hence the late reply)