Hassan Toufanian ( Persian : حسن طوفانیان ‎; 20 July 1913 – 28 August 1998) was an Iranian Air Force General under the Shah of Iran . He was a graduate of the Iranian Military Academy and later served as commanding officer of Iran's flight academy. In 1977 he was the Shah's Vice Minister of War and led Project Flower , which entailed an economic deal between Iran and Israel which would have built cooperation and exchanged Iranian oil for an Israeli missile system, but which collapsed in 1979 during the Iranian Revolution .