It has been reported through a series of memoirs that once a US agent brought a message from the then US president Jimmy Carter for Imam Khomeini.
The US agent and representative said that “you must follow Shapour Bakhtiar” who was an Iranian politician who served as the last prime minister of Iran under the rule of the Shah regime.
The agent issued threats that if Imam doesn’t follow their advice what could happen and consequences.
The message was conveyed to Imam during his stay in exile in Paris.
Imam ignored his threat and said that Carter must know that until now I have contained my people in Iran and if I ask them what they can do is beyond the US president’s imagination.
The incident happened some months before Imam returned to his homeland leading the Islamic Revolution to victory in 1979.
Extracted from the late Haj Seyyed Ahmad Khomeini, impressions of Imam's biography, volume 4, page 208
Born on October 1, 1924, James Earl Carter Jr. was the 39th President of the United States from the Democratic Party from 1977 to 1981.
Carter went to the Oval Office when a year later, the Islamic Revolution of Iran led by the Late Imam Khomeini won over the US-backed Dictatorship of Mohammad-Reza Pahlavi.
Amidst the victory of the Islamic Revolution, the Iranian people seized the US Embassy in Tehran as a place for the American spies, calling it the Den of Espionage and capturing the US spies who worked there as ambassadors and diplomats.
The US ambassadors shredded most of their espionage documents yet they were recovered by the Iranian students.
Carter then issued an order to carry out a military operation to free the captives. Yet, the US Army's Operation Eagle Claw was failed due to the historic Sand Storm of Tabas Desert, central Iran.