THE BATTLE FOR IRAN

• Document Type: FOIA
• Collection: FOIA Collection
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): 01384460
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: U
• Document Page Count: 150
• Document Creation Date: March 8, 2023
• Document Release Date: August 12, 2019
• Case Number: F-2017-02350
• Publication Date: May 12, 1954

1.0111-%
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THE BATTLE FOR IRAN
Contents
I. INTRODUCTION
II. IRAN, ANCIENT AND MODERN
A. The Nation
I. Imperial Past
2: The People
3. The Economy
4. Politics and Government
B. Between Russia and The West
1. Aggression from the North
2. The Oil Dispute, 1949-53
3. Iran and U.S. Foreign Policy
III. COVERT ACTION
A. The Genesis of TPAJAX
B. The Planning Phase
C. Putting the Plan into Action
D. Involving the Shah
E. The First Attempt--and Failure
F. Turning Defeat Around
IV. THE AFTERMATH OF VICTORY
V. THE LONG VIEW OF THE COVERT ACTION IN IRAN
APPENDICES
A. Whose Oil? An Abbreviated History
of the Anglo-Iranian Oil Dispute
8. Biographic Sketches
C. The Legend: The Iranian Operation,in the Press
D. The Plans for TPAJAX
E. Chronology
F. The Trial of Mosadeq and Riahi
G. Map of Tehran
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,
FOREWORO
This account of the role of the Central Intelligence Agency
in the political action operation that altered the course of
history in Iran was written with the enthusiastic cooperation
of the Near East Division, Directorate of Operations. It is
based on files remaining in the Division (although the great
bulk of the correspondence and traffic dealing with the
operation was destroyed in 1962), on the draft history written
in 1954 by Dr. Donald N. Wilber, on personal interviews with a
number of active and retired Agency officers who participated
in the action, on Central Reference Service personality files,
and on a variety of open sources. Unless otherwise noted,
major documentary sources were NE Division files .
Claud H. Corrigan
CIA History Staff
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THE BATTLE FOR IRAN
I. INTRODUCTION
Iran in late 1952 was sliding toward economic and political chaos.
Its young ruler, Mohammad Reza Shah, was indecisive and vacillating in
the face of the crisis created by his fanatically nationalistic Premier,
the 72-year-old Mohammad Mosadeq.1 His country was involved in a bitter
dispute with Great Britain over the oil concession that the British had
since 1901 built into a lucrative industry. Iran's nationalists, personi-
fied by Mosadeq, had paralyzed this industry rather than allow foreigners
to continue to direct its operations and benefit from their natural
resources. With the dispute at an impasse and with Mosadeq ruling by
decree, the country seemed headed for an economic collapse and political
anarchy whose final outcome could well have been the establishment of a
Soviet satellite in the Middle East. How the diplomatic and intelligence
servicesof the United States
worked with Iranians
loyal to the Shah to prevent the loss of Iran is the subject of this
history. Understanding of how and why this action was taken will be
clarified by an initial review of historical events and of Iran's people,
economy, and politics.
II. IRAN, ANCIENT AND MODERN
A. The Nation
1. Imperial Past
The first Persian2 empire, that of the Achaemenid dynasty,
was founded by Cyrus the Great in the Sixth Century B.C. through conquest
1
2
Persia was derived through Greek from Persis, the name the Greeks
used for Parsa, the tribe and province of the Achaemenids. In 1935 Reza
Shah insisted that foreigners use Iran, the native usage which means "Land
of the Aryans," rather fwcapp..
See Appendix B for a brief biography of Mosadeq.
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bf.the Medes and other kingdoms of the region now generally known
as the Middle East. Cyrus' grandson, Darius, further extended the
- .
empire, which he divided into 20 satraps or provinces Connected by
a network of imperial roads. The Achaemenid empire endured for almost
200 years, until it was destroyed by Alexander the Great of Macedonia.
the Greeks Were soon succeeded by the Parthian dynasty, which in turn
was followed by the Sassanids, who ruled for 400 years from the third to
the seventh centuries A.D. and who restored the glory of ancient Persia.
In 651, however, the Arab invasion swept across Persia, which for the
next nine centuries was ruled by a succession of foreign conquerors. A
native Persian dynasty
when the Safavids came
reached its peak under
overthrew the Savavids
rose again at the beginning of the 16th century
to power; their rule lasted over 200 years .and
Shah Abbas from 1587 to 1620. Invading Afghans
in 1722 and were in turn driven out by Nadir Shah,
a Turkic-speaking tribesman who launched a campaign of conquest that
included invasions of India and the Caucasus. The succeeding dynasty,
that of the Qajars, lasIgitil the early 1920's when Reza Khan, a colonel
3
in the Iranian army's Cossack Division, seized power in a military coup.
He became Shah in 1925, deposing the Qajars and founding the
Pahlavi dynasty. W hen Iran was occupied in 1941 by British and
Soviet-troops in order to guarantee the Allied supply route to the
Reza Shah
embattled Russians,/ abdicated and was succeeded by his son, Mohammad
Reza Pahlavi, the present Shah.
2. rhe people
Of Iran's population in 1952 of under 18 million, more
than 70-A; were ethnic Iranians of Indo-Europaan stock; Persians made up
3
See Appendix B for biographic details on Reza Shah.
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.'50A of the total. The other ethnic Iranians included Kurdish, 0ilani,
Mazandarani, Lur,
Bakhtiari,
and Baluchi tribesmen, many of whom were
nomadic or seminomadic peoples. Another 22A or so of the population
were Turkic peoples, primarily the Azerbaijani of the northwestern
provinces but also including the Turkoman and Clashclai tribal groups.
Arabs made up about 5% of the population, and the remainder were
non-Muslims, including Armenians, Assyrians, and Jews. Persian (or
Farsi; as it is known in Iran) was the official language, spoken by
most ethnic Iranians, although Turkic and Arabic dialects were also
in use.
Almost all Iranians are Shia Muslims, in contrast to the Sunnis
who predominate in the Muslim world. Shiites believe that the true
succession to the leadership of Islam continued through the line of
'Ali (Mohamnad's son-in-law) in the series of the 12 Imams, in contrast
to the Sunnis who insist that the Caliphs succeeding Mohammad were
selected by the consensus of the Muslim community. Although there is
no organized Shia hierarachy, certain titles distinguish special mem-
bers of the religious community.
A cleric of limited theological
training is a "mullah," while one who has studied at a higher insti-
tution is aumujtahid" and qualified to adjudicate questions of
religious conduct. The most important Iranian religious leaders have
borne the honorary title of "Ayatollah," and the leader at the Shrine
:4-
at the city of Qom may issue decrees which have the force of la.( to the
faithful. A descendant of Mohammad may use the title "Sayyid" as part
of his name, but he is not necessarily a religious figure.
The social structure in the early 1950's included an elite composed
of the shah, his court, and the 200 or more ruling families whose wealth
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derived from agricultural landholdings. Below the elite was the upper
middle class that included government officials, professional men,
_ .
importers, bankers, and merchants. The urban middle class consisted
mainly of small merchants, craftsmen, lower level clergy, and teachers
and as a group had not benefited greatly from the economic development
and educational opportunities of the previous two decades. rhe day
laborers, street vendors, and service workers were at the bottom of the
urban class structure,' Most of the country's people were working
_
in the 1950 era .as tenants bound to
_
their landlords by an almost feudal system. Outside the Iranian social
structure were the tribes, whose social system in times of peace impeded
the progress and modernization of Iran and was a source of weakness. In
times of stress, however, the tribes were a source of strength.-
Cp.fn the 1941-45
period, they remained relatively untouched by the general collapse, but
internal nonetheless . national
while retaining somwtability, the tribesAcontributed Wonfusion
and disorder through their clannish narrow-mindedness, tribal rather than
national loyalties, and readiness to resort to violence.
As a people, Iranians have been described* as having an intense
national pride that has resulted from a fairly homogeneous stock and a
2,500-year history. In spite of this pride in the
achievements of past dynasties and the high level of intelligence among
those who have had the means to develop their potentials, the national
movement of the 1950's accomplished little.
4
John Marlow in Iran: A Short Political Guide, Frederick A. Praeger;
New York; 1963.
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Among the reasons accounting for
this are the fact that nationalistic feelings and native intelligence
�are often accompanied by an individualism that inhibits-cooperations-by
a cynicism that despises enthusiasm, by an impatience that derides
calculation, and by a volubility that abhors discretion. Their nationalism
thus has lackeclan air of common purpose, of willingness to sacrifice,
of the dedication that has given impetus to the national movements of
other, less well-endowed peoples.
3. The economy
In 1950 Iran was still basically an agricultural nation
with a backward economy.
Farming, stock raising, forestry, and fisheries
probably accounted for half the gross national product; wheat was the
major crop, followed by barley, rice, cotton, and tobacco. Manufacturing
was growing in importance, with textiles--cotton and wool--leading the
cement, match, and glass industries, although food processing was still
the most important non-oil activity.
Oil, of course, prior to 1951 when the effects of the dispute with
the British were severely felt, was contributing about a third of
budgetary revenue and nearly two-thirds of foreiyn exchange. Oil revenues
started to climb when the war/ended, going fromi7.13 million in
1946 to g16.03 million in 1950; by
1952, they were onlyg8.3 million. In 1950, 31,217,000 metric tons
of oil were exported, but this fell to 9,158,000 metric tons in 1951 and
to a pitiful 14,000 metric tons in 1952 when the British left.
5
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4. Politics and government
Until the early years of the 20th century, Persia had either
, _
been an absolute monarchy or had been under the rule of foreign invaders.
In July 1906, however, popular resentment against the excesses of Muzaffir
ad-Din, a Shah of the Qajar dynasty whose excursions to Europe were nearly
bankrupting his country's treasury, grew so strong that widespread demon-
strations and riots forced him to proclaim a constitution. This Telatively
ed.
liberal.document, supplemention 1907 and amended in 1925, 1949, and 1957,
provided for a government of three branches. The power of the executive
was vested in the cabinet and in government officials acting in the Shah's
name. The judiciary was composed of a hierarchy of civil courts up through
the Supreme Court, while the legislative branch comprised the parliament,
or Majlis,
1949,;
he smaller Senate, half of whose members were appointed by the Shah and
half elected.
of 136 members, elected by the people every 2 years, ansl, after
Whatever power remained in the hands of the Qajar Shah vanished soon.
after World War I, in which Iran had maintained a slightly pro-German
the forces of'.
neutrality that was violated by/Turkey, Russia, and Britain. In February
1921, a young reformist politician Seyyid Zia ed-Oin Tabatabai, and Col.
5
Reza Khan, commander of the Iranian Cossack Division, combined to overthrow
the government. Zia ed-Din became Premier and Reza Khan commander-in-chief
of the army, but the two soon quarreled, and Zia ed-Uin fled into exile -1
(in May 1921. Reza Khan remained
5 The Cossack Division, at that time the only well-organized and effective
unit in the army, came into being as a result of Nasr ed-Uin Shah's visit
to Russia in 1373. The Shah admired his Cossack escort and asked the Czar
to send him Russian officers to organize a Cossack cavalry regiment in the
Iranian army. it grew to a brigade and then a division, and its White
Russian officers and noncoms were retained until October 1920, when Reza
Khan replaced Col. Starrosselsky as commander and other Iranians took over
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..in power as Minister of War, devoting himself to the reorganization of
the army. Unifying the heterogeneous military units into a closely knit,
expel the Bolsheviks,
centrally controlled army, he employed it Wacify-Azarbaija9land
quell the rebellious tribes. Reza Khan took over as Premier in 1923, and
two years later he 'became Shah. -
Ti-e two focal points of Reza Shah's dictatorial rule were nationalism
and modernization, and in this he greatly resembled Kemal Ataturk ip
Turkey, although his methods and goals were less radical. He improved
the status of women and checked the power of the Shia clergy, but he
stopped short of Ataturk's romanization of the national language--Farsi
retained its Arabic script. As a nationalist, he was suspicious and
guarded toward the Soviet Union andchallenging toward the British,
particOarly as to the oil concession, which he felt did not sufficiently
benefit Iran. He brought in first American and then German economic
advisers to reorganize the country s finances and to serve as a counter-
weigh to Soviet and British influence.
Reza Shah's dictatorial rule ended with the occupation of his
country by the Soviets and the British in August 1941--an episode that
will be discussed below--and a month later he abdicated in favor of his
.
son, Mohammad Reza Pahlavl,6 who was proclaimed Shah by the Majlis. He
left Iran at once and eventually didd in exile in south Africa in 1944.
The Iranian government he left behind faced a difficult period, with a
ussian occupation in the north and a British one in the south. Tehran
remained a neutral zone, but the Allies controlled the transportation
6 His biography appears in r�ppendix B.
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.-Si&tem and wartime shortages of food and consumer goods led to a
_
crippling inflation.
Suddenly brought to power in an occupied country, the young Shah,
partially
who had beerNducated in Europe and who was believed to favor constitu-
tional government, was unable
to provide strong leadership
to his government. As a result the power of the Majlis increased, a
large number of transitory political parties and partisan newspapers
�
were started, the tribes again becameebfiant, the clergy became stronger,
A
and the Communists--banned as a party in the 1920's--returned in the
guise of the Tudeh Party. Tudeh, headed by leftists and former Communist
Party members, received funds and direction from Moscow and recruited
both members and sympathizers .throughout Iran during the war years and
until its overt apparatus was crushed in 1954.
Little more than a department of Reza Shah's government in the 1920's
and 1930's, the Majlis emerged from the years of occupation as a relt valized
- _
It insisted on confirming the appointment of the
if irresponsible
poltical force.
U.S. financial advisory mission in 1942, it imposed limits on .the govern-
ment's right to negotiate oil concessions, and it took on the selection
of a new Premier as its privilege--although the Shah retained the right
to approve or disapprove the choice. In its dealings with Premiers or
Shahs, the Majlis had a powerful weapon--the quorum veto. The constitution
stated that the Majlis could only be considered convened when two-thirds of
its 136 deputies had reached Tehran, and half of those present in the
capital constituted a quorum. thus, if 91 deputies were in Tehran, the
absence of 46 of them could keep the assembly from functioning.
Political parties in the Western sense had never been strong in Iran,
and during the war years their number had multiplied. Only the Tudeh was
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an effective political organization, and it was included among the
-ininority9-parties opposed to_the..I'majorite.Hgrouping that_tended__
to vote together on key national issues.
In general, political forces
in postwar Iran had sorted themselves out into left, right, and center
groups. Tudeh and its sympathizers were on the left. The right was
more hetero;eneous and included Dr. Mohammad Mosadeq's National Front,7
the fanatical religious organizations Fedayan Islam and Mpjahadin Islam,8
the several small fascist parties most Tehran University students and
professors, amd many small merchants and businessmen. The center was
moderate and inclined to be more pro-Western; it included the Shah, most
army officers, the Democratic Party, and the wealthy merchants and land-
owners who favored the-status quo. Aided by landowner control over the
peasant vote, center candidates usually won the majority of Majlis seats,
but in the late 1940'5 and early 1950's, the nationalistic policies of
the right regularly won the voting support of the left and center.
B. Between Russia and the West
1. Aggression from the North
Iran lost wars and territory to Czarist Russia in 1813 and
again in 1328 and has lived in varying degrees of dread of its northern
neighbor ever since. Great Britain was the counterbalance to Russian
power--the British goal was to keep Iran as a buffer between Russia and
7 For example, in the 16th Majlis, elected in 1950, the National Front
was composed of Mosadeq and eight followers who nonetheless were usually
able to carry a majority of deputies with them on key votes.
8 Fedayan Islam, numbering at most a few hundred' members, carried out
terrorist acts in support of its goal of restablishing
law and practice to a dominant place in Iran. Mojahadin
Islam was more political; its religious spearhead in the Majlis included
mullah Ayatollah Kashani and Shams Qanatabadi, two influential, politically
oriented religious leaders.
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India--until 1907, when Britain and ^ussia signed an agreement to
divide Iran into zones of influence. rhe British purpose was to
secure Russia as an ally in Europe against the growing power of Im-
perial Germany, and the result was that northern and central Iran as
far south as Isfahan was open to Russian economic and political influ-
ence. The British zone was southeastern Iran adjacent to Indian Baluchi-
stan until 1915, when in return for rights to the oil-rich southwestern
.zone the British recognized Russian claims to control of the Turkish
Straits.
During World War I, Iranian neutrality was violated by the Turks,
the Russians, and the British; the Russians entered northern Iran to
counter
Turkish advances through Iran toward the Caucasus while the
British sent in troops and organized Iranians into the British-officered
South Persian Rifles to counter German atteTpts at subversion among the
tribes and sabotage of the oil pipeline. The Russian military collapse
in 1917 left a vacuum in northern
viks, Turks, Germans, and British
shevik intervention in Russia and
Iran and the Caucasus that the Bolshe-
attempted to fill. BritairiS anti-Mot-
Iran ended in 1919, but a treaty was
concluded with Iran in August 1919 that would have made Iran a virtual
British protectorate. This treaty was never ratified by the Majlis
however, and when Reza Khan and Seyyid Zia ed-Din seized power 1921,
Iran formally repudiated it.
From the start, Soviet Russia's official policy toward Iran was
friendly. In a January 1918 note, the Soviets renounced all Czarist
privileges contrary to the sovereignty of Iran and promised to aid the
Iranians in expelling British and Turkish occupying forces. Their note
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also declared that the 1907 treaty with Britain was no longer binding.
In an additional note of 26 June 1919, the Russians annulled all Iranian
debts, renounced all nussian concessions in Iran--including the Russian
Discount Bank and all railroads, harbors and highways built by them--
and declared the capitulations (privileges and exemptions guaranteed to
hussian citizens in Iran) null and void. The Soviet-Iranlan. Treaty of
.
Friendship of February 1921 formalized the provisions of the 1919 note,
renounced any interference in one another's internal affairs, gave Iran
the right to maintain naval forces in the Caspian Sea, and permitted
Russia to send troops into Iran if it should become a base for a
third-country threat to the Soviet Union. (This final provision, which _
originally applied to White Kussian forces, was subject ,
to Soviet interpretation of what constituted a threat_and-was a
significant factor in restraining forceful British response to the Iranian
takeover of the oil industry in 1951.)
Iranian relations with the Soviets in the 1920's concentrated on trade,
which built up significantly until 1926, when a sudden and strict embargo
was placed on Iranian agricultural products, mainly from the northern pro-
vinces. The embargo forced Iran to ccnclude a commercial treaty with the
Russians that introduced barter transactions and gave the Soviets exclusive
marketing privileges in Iran. . This had several results: The Soviet share
of Iranian foreign trade rose from 232 in 1926-27 to over 38/0 in 1923-29;
Iranian industrial development was deliberately discouraged by the arti-
ficially low prices the Soviets put on competitive manufactured goods;
and, Iran began to turn toward Germany as a foreign trade partner.
Germany, in addition to increasing its purdbases of Iranian products,
also became involved in the construction of the Trans-Aranian Railway, one
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of Reza Shah's most important accomplishments.
Germans ran Iran's
internal airlines in the late 1920's and the 19301s, supplied railway
rolling stock and mcitor vehicl_!s_t and aided industrialization in
Iran by setting up foundries, coal mining equipment, a cement factory,
textile and paper mills, and a machinegun factory. A German financial
adviser replaced the American Or. Arthur Millspaugh in 1927, and the
Germans and Iranians signed a trade treaty in 1923 and a treaty of
friendship in 1929. As a result, Germany's share of Iran's foreign
trade rose from 8% in 1932-33 to 45.5% in 1940-41, and by August 1941
the number of German advisers, technicians, and businessmen in Iran
reached 2,000.
The nature and extent of this German penetration into Iran became
very significant when German armed forces invaded Russia in 1941 and
rapidly moved deeply into the 'oviet Union. Iran was the shortest and
most feasible route for badly needed war materials to be sent to Russia
by its new allies in the West. Further, the possibility of a German
takeover in Iran was a risk the flussians could not allow. On 19 July and.
16 August 1941 the British and Soviet diplomatic missions in Tehran pre-
sented notes demanding the expulsion of the Germans in Iran, but Iran
insisted it was neutral and that no danger existed. On 25 Augusta., the
final Allied demands were presented and the invasion began; the Soviets
entered Iron from the north in three columns, the British from the south
in two. Iranian armed resistance was negligible except for a sharp fight
in Khuzistan that cost 55 British casualties. The Ali Mansur cabinet
resigned on 27 August, and the official surrender took place the next day.
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Under its 'terms, the Soviets were to occupy the five northern provinces
and the British the southern provinces, leaving central Iran and the
capital to the Iranians; all Germans were to be expelled or turned over
to the Allies; Iran was to facilitate the transport of Allied supplies.
Reza Shah's position was made untenable by the poor performance of his
army and by the subsequent hostile Allied propaganda campaign, and he
abdicated in favor of his 22-year-old son on 16 September 1941. Although
most Germans were interned or sent back to Germany, a number of key agents
escaped and sought to stir up the tribes to sabotage and rebellion; Maj.
_ilotijnaus
Julius Schulze worked among the Qashqii, and Franz Mayr tried to stir up
A the Kurds and sabotage the railroads. A number of prominent Iranians were
e
found to be listed among May,r s actual or potential agents, and many of
A
them--including Maj. Gen. Fazlollah Zahedi, who in 1953 became the leading
Iranian military man in the coup that ousted Mosadeq and who succeeded -
him as Premier --were arrested and sent to detention camps in Palestine.
The de facto situation of the occupation was confirmed by the Tripartite
Treaty of Alliance signed by the 'oviet Union, Britain, and Iran on 29 June
1942. In this treaty, the Allies promised to withdraw their forces from
Iran not later than six months after hostilities with Germany and its
associates had ceased. Although the Iranians feared Russia and disliked
the British presence and methods employed in seizing and running the
transport system, they declared war on Germany in September 1943; presumably
to ensure being on the winning side. When Roosevelt, Churchill, and Stalin
met in Tehran in November 1943 (without ever officially consulting or
advising the Iranian government), they signed the Declaration on Iran, which
reco;nized Iranian assistance to the war effort, promised economic aid,
and reaffirmed Iran's independence, sovereignty, and territorial integrity.
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Nonetheless, when the war ended in 1945, there were difficulties
with the Soviets. In late 1944, they attempted to get Iranian approval
,
. . .
For their exploitation of oil In Semnan in the Soviet zone. "The furor
over Iran's rejection of this offer; W.-rich was backed up by U.S. Ambassa-
dor Leland Morris' statement that the U.S. Government recognized the
sovereign right of Iran to refuse to grant oil concessions, led to the
resignation of Premier Sa'ed. With the new Premier under heavy Soviet
pressure; Mohammad Mosadeq introduced a bill into the Majlis making it
a crime for any cabinet minister to enter into negotiations with or to
grant-oil-concessions to foreigners without the approval of the Majlis.
The bill was passed on 2 December 1944.
Frustrated in their attempts to obtain a solid claim to oil in
northern Iran, the Soviets became reluctant to leave Azarbaijan. On 29
November 1945, the United States proposed that all Allied troops be
evacuated by 1 January 1946, but the Soviets insisted on the March 1946
date previously agreed to by the British. On 12 December, the "Autonomous
Republic of Azarbaijan" was proclaimed, a national assembly elected, and.
Ja'afar Pishevari a veteran Comintern agent,- was named Premier. At the
same time a Kurdish uprising took place in western Azarbaijan, and a
Kurdish People's Republic/ proclaimed- with Qazi Mohammad as president;
1
it prompt y allied itself with the "Autonomous Republic."
On 22 January 1946, the Shah asked Qavam as-Saltaneh to form a
new government. After dismissing General Arfa, who had pro-British
tendencies as Chief of Staff, Qavam went to Moscow in February to
negotiate with the ussians. The Soviets proposed that their troops
remain indefinitely in parts of Iran, that Iran recognize the internal
autonomy of Azarbaijan
..�Nwerihtkkr.-34ri:Ve.I'4*AirlIM
(whose premier would
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general), and that rather than a Soviet oil concession a joint
Iranian-Russian stock company be set up, with 51% f the shares to be .
owned by Russia, 49A by Iran. Qavam rejected these demands and returned
to Tehran, where he faced a political crisis. The 14th Majlis was due
to end its two-year term on 11 March 1946, and it had voted that no
elections for the next Majlis could be held while foreign troops were
h2sci
still in the country (U.S. forces left Iran 1 January, the British on
A
2 March). The deputies' attempts to meet and vote to extend their
terms were frustrated by Tudeh demonstrators, who until after 11 March
physically prevented a quorum from gathering. Qavam was thus left to.
_
rule the country until the 15th Majlis could be elected,.
Iran then brought the matter of the continuing Soviet occupation
before the new United Nations Security Council, and under U.N. and U.S.
pressure, the Soviets on 4 April 1946 concluded an agreement with Iran
that called for evacuation of all Soviet troops within a month and a
half after 24 March 1946, the establishment of a joint stock oil com-
pany which would be approved by .the Majlis within 7 months after 24
March, and arrangements for improvement of relations between the
Iranian government and the people of Azarbaijan.
Accordingly, Qavam worked out an agreement with Pishevari that would
have conceded most Communist demands while leaving Azarbaijan under the
nominal authority of Tehran. The Soviets appeared to be gaining influence
-
in Iran, an impression that was reinforced when on 2 August 1946 Qavam
brought three Tudeh Party members and a Tudeh sympathizer into his
"popular front" cabinet. In the meantime, Tudeh had provoked an oil
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workers' strike in Khuzistan that involved 100,000 workers 0-
violence and sabotage.
The inclusion of4Tudeh in the Qavam government brought ,
British reaction. British troops were moved from India to n-
Iraq, with the stated purpose of securing supplies of Irani.:.
Britain needed. Then, with encouragement from British cons�:
military advisers in their region, a coalition of Qashciai, a.
and other tribesmen was formed which in a demonstration of I
Boshire, Abadeh, Kazerun, Bandar Amir, and besieged Shiraz.
was ultimately worked out in mid-October between the tribal '
Khan Qashclai, and General Zahedi, then commanding the garri%
in which the government recognized the tribes' demands. On
Qavam resigned and took office again, and the new cabinet Fr:
not include the Tudehites; on 24 blovember Qavam ordered the .
Azarbaijan to supervise the elections for the 19th Majlis.
chance to redeem itself for the failure in 1941, the army
enthusiastically. There was little resistance from the HO
Azarbaijan forces, and on 14 December the "autonomous" -
collapsed. The army also captured the Kurdish stronghold oi
executing the leaders of that rebellion. In Tehran, Tudeh
were raided, and the way was opened for the elections to be
When the 15th Majlis was finally inaugurated in August
opposition led by Dr. Mosadeq,began to fight the.ratificati,
oil agreement. In the face of Soviet pressure on the Irani .
U.S. Ambassador,f.eorge V. Allen, in a speech on 11 Septemb.
Irano-American Cultural Relations Society, made it clear th_
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free to accept or reject the Soviet offer, and that in any case Iran would
be supported by the United States against Soviet threats or pressure.
Citing-American-policy aimed at removing-the'fear' Of-aggression anywhere
in the world, Allen said:
The United States is firm in its conviction thatany proposals
made by one sovereign government to another should not be accompanied
by threats or intimidation. When such methods are used in an effort to
obtain acceptance doubt is cast on the value of the proposals.
Our determination to follow this policy as regards Iran is as
strong as anywhere else in the world. This purpose can be achieved
to the extent that the Iranian people show a determination to defend
their own sovereignty. Patriotic Iranians, when considering matters
affecting their national interest, may therefore rest assured that the
American people will support fully their freedome to make their own
choice.
Iran's resources belong to Iran. Iran can give them away free of.
charge or refuse to dispose of them at any price if it so desires.9
Thus convinced of U.S. support, on 22 October 1947 the Majlis rejected
the Soviet oil agreement by a vote of 102 to 2 and instead passed a bill
that forbade further oil concessions to foreign governments or partners
and called for negotiations with the Anglo-Iranian Oil Company for a
greater share of the profits. This measure was to have, far-reaching effects
on Iran's relations with Great Britain and the United States.
2. The Oil Dispute, 1949-53
The involvement of Great Britain in Iranian oil went back
to the original D'Arcy concession of 1901, the first of a series of grants
that were renegotiated at various times to keep up with the growth of
the oil industry and world demand for oil. The Anglo-Persian Oil Company
was founded in 1909, but it took on a new complexion in 1914 when the
British government became the major shareholder. The reason for this
9 The New York Times, 12 September 1947
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official investment was obvious; Winton Churchill became First Lord
of the Admiralty in 1911 and forced the decision which had been debated
for nearly a decade, to convert the Royal Navy from burning coal to
burning oil. On the brink of a major war, the navy had to be assured
-Tbe_
of a source of oil, which was both efficient and cheap. Anglo-Persian
A
(Anglo-Iranian, after 1935) Oil Company
continued to extract oil under its
original concession for the next 3.0 or so years, building pipelines as
well as a large refinery at Abadan. The concession was rereptiated in
1933 to give Iran a greater share of the net profits and to modify the
concession area. Managers and technicians continued to be either British
or Indian, with the Iranians providing unskilled or semiskilled labor.
Following the passage of the Majlis legislation of 1947 rejecting the
soviet oil concession, the Iranian government presented to Anglo-Iranian
a list of 25 points to be discussed. Chief among these were British taxation
on Iran's share of company profits, Iran's rights to the canpany's installa-
tions at the end of the concession in 1993, a reduction in the number of
British employees, the royalty basis--that is, the price to be paid to
Iran for each barrel extracted and sold through AIOC's marketing and
transporting system, and Iranian tax and custom exemptions. After lengthy
discussions, the so-called "Supplemental Agreement" raising the royalty
payment from 4 to 6 shillings a ton and giving Iran 20/0 of distributed
profits and general reserve was sent to the Majlis on 19 July 1949.
Debate began shortly thereafter, but the term of the 15th Majlis
ended before a vote on ratification could be taken. Elections for the
16th Aajlis were fidally completed in March 1950, and Mosadeq and his
eight National Front colleagues led the balloting in Tehran. Ali Mansur
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was named Premier, and the proposed Supplemental Agreement was turned
,over to the Aajlis Special Oil Commission for study in June 1950, the
same month in which Gen. Ali Razmara, a former Chief of Staff, became
Premier. he commission's report to the Majlis stated that the
agreement did not adequately secure Iran's rights and should not be
ratified. Razmara's Minister of Finance then withdrew the agreement
and reopened negotiations with the AIOC, which by February 1951 was
willing to agree to a 50-50 profit sharing similar to the agreement that
Aramco had worked out with Saudi Arabia. Razmara, however, had asked a
group of experts to study the feasibility of nationalization of the oil
industry; their view was that Iran lacked sufficient technical expertise
to run the industry, that the concession could not legally be cancelled,
that heavy compensation would be due Britain, and that both foreign
exchange and prestige would be lost by hasty nationalization. When
Razmara opposed immediate nationalization as impractical under the
circumstances, he was assassinated on
7 March 1951 by a member of Fedayan Islam, the rightist religious
terrorist group. Hosein Ala briefly succeeded Razmara as Premier, and
the Majlis approved the principle of nationalizing oil. When Ala resigned
in April, the Majlis voted to recommend Mosadeq to the Shah as Premier,
and he was. appointed to the post on 29 April. Acting swiftly, the Majlis
approved on 1 May a nine-point nationalization law. This act began a
summer of hectic but fruitless bargaining that culminated in impasse and
the departure in October 1951 of British managers and technicians.
Because the true issue in the dispute was political, in that the
Iranians had come to identify oil with their own
resurgent nationalism, the two governments were never able to understand
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one another's position. The British, attempting to deal with a political
problem in economic terms, believed that the Iranians had to sell their
oil or go broke and that the best approach was to wait them out, at
first for workable terms and later--after nationalization--for adequate
compensation. The Iranians assuming that the West could not do without
aeir oil, were convinced that by hiring non-British technicians and
leasing tankers they could operate the oil industry .on their own. To
the British, the Iranians seemed irrational and wasteful; to the Iranians,
the British appeared overconfident and condescending. As a result, their �
negotiations were so unproductive and mutually frustrating that the
British even considered military intervention to seize Abadan, although
the strong possibility that the Soviet Union would invoke its 1921 treaty
with Iran to oppose such a British move served as an effective deterrent.
rhe legalistic approach of the British government, which as the major
stockholder in the AIOC regarded the oil concession as a treaty or, at
the very least, an agreement between nations, was to take the matter first
before the International Court of Justice and then to the Security Council
of the United Nations. In the end, the Security Louncil deferred to the
decision of the ICJ as to its ow jurisdiction, and when in June 1952 the
court ruled that the concession was not a treaty and hence not^a proper
matter for it to consider, all legal approaches were exhausted. The
dispute was at an impassey and by October 1952 diplomatic relations
between the two countries were broken off.10
3. Iran and U.S. Foreign Policy
United States foreign policy under President Harry Truman has
10 more detailed but still necessarily brief description of the oil
dispute is included as Appendix B to this history.
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been generally characterized as the "containment" of Communist aggression.
Whatever its name, the policy evolved in 1947 when the British Government
informed the United States that it could no longer afford to support
Greece and Turkey--militarily and financially--against the very real
threat of Soviet aggression and subversion. In assuming this burden,
Truman said in a message delivered before Congress in March 1947:
I believe that it must be the policy of the United States to
support free peoples who are resisting attempted subjugation by armed
minorities or by outside pressures.
I believe that we must assist free peoples to work out their
own destinies in their own way.
I believe that our help should be primarily through economic
and financial aid which is essential to economic stability and orderly
political processes.
The world is not static, and the status quo is not sacred.
But we cannot allow changes in the status quo in violation of the
Charter of the United Nations by such methods as coercion, or by
such subterfuges as political infiltration. In helping free and
independent nations to maintain their freedom, the United States
will be giving effect to the principles of the Charter...
Should we fail to aid Greece and Turkey in this fateful hour, 11
the effect will be far-reaching to the West as well as to the East....
Usually credited with originating the containment theory behind the
Truman doctrine is George F. Kennan, who in February 1946 as counselor of
the U. S. Embassy in Moscow sent the Department of State a long telegram
in which he analyzed Soviet postwar policy aims. His telegram struck
responsive chords in Washington; James Forrestal, then Secretary of the
Navy and later the first Secretary of Defense, gave the telegram wide
circulation within the national security bureaucracy. When Kennan
returned from his tour of duty in Russia, Forrestal sponsored him for
the post of director of the National War k:ollege, where he stayed for
less than a year before becoming head of State's new Policy Planning Staff.
11 Public Papers of the Presidents of the United States: Harry S. Truman,
1947. U.S. Government vrinting Office; Washington, 0.6.; 1963; pp.173-9
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Kennants article "The Sources of Soviet Conduct," which appeared
in Foreign Affairs for July 1947 and which is credited with the initial
statement of the containment policy, was an amp)ification of his Moscow
telegram. It was originally written for Forrestal in response to a
paper on Oarxism and Soviet power prepared by a Forrestal staffer and
sent to Kerman for comment.12
In January 1947, Kennan addressed the Council
on Foreign Relations in New York on his views on the Soviet Union, and
Foreign Affairs editor Hamilton Fish Armstrong asked him for a paper along
the lines of the talk for publication in that journal. Rather than write
another paper, Kennan asked Forrestal's permission to publish the one he
had done earlier, and when this was forthcoming, sent it to Armstrong
with the request that it be signed "X".
In the "X" paper's description of the exercise of Soviet power,
Kennan noted the innate antagonism between capitalism and socialism that
was deeply imbedded in the minds of Soviet leaders. Moscow invariably
assumed that the aims of the capitalist world were antagonistic to
Soviet interests, and that, said Kennan, "means that we are going to
continue for a long time to find the Russians difficult to deal with."
Thus, he continued, "...the main element of any U.S. policy toward the
Soviet Union must be that of a long-term, patient but firm and ,vigilant
containment of Kssian expansive tendencies." These could be contained
"by th adroit and vigilant application of counter-force at a series
of constantly shifting geographical and political points, corresponding
to the shifts and manoeuvers of Soviet policy, but which cannot be
12 Much of this background is taken from John C. Donovan, The Cold
Warriors; D.C. Heath & Co., Lexington, Mass., Toronto, and London; 1974.
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charmed or talked out of existence." 13
_liowever�in_Kennan's view and in that of former Secretary Of-State----
11+
Dean.ACheson, he was not the author of a containment policy or doctrine;
he merely described what was happening.
That he did it well, in a way
that met the approval of a number of key policymakers of the time is
obvious, but it was continued Soviet intransigence in pursuing openly
Worth
aggressive policies that led to the U.S. reaction to the/Korean invasion
15
in 1950, and the Korean War in turn institutionalized a set of
operational premises along these lines:
A. The Soviet Union would resort to military expansionism if
it were not checked by visible countervailing military power;
B. Local imbalances of military power which favored the
Soviets or a Soviet satellite would lead to further "Koreas";
C. The most appetizing local- imbAance to the Soviets was
in Central Europe;
D. The global balance of power would shift in favor of the
Soviets if they were able to swallow the rest of Central Europe, i.e.,
West Germany and Austria; only the Greco-Turkish flanks had such a
critical function for the balance of power (Japan was next most
critical);
L. Local imbalances in secondary and tertiary areas must not
be neglectd; the capability and clearly communicated will to defend
whatever areas the Communists chose to attack was necessary to prevent
them from picking and chosing ea,sy targets for blackmail and aggression.
-
A number of small territorial grabs could add up to a critical altera-
tion of the global balance, and our failure to defend one area would
demoralize nationals in other such localities in their will to
resist the Communists.
It was against this background of U.S. policy and .planning that
the status of Iran in late 1952 was considered, and although Dwight D.
13 In later years, writing in his Memoirs--1925-50, Kerman said that
the X article's most serious defect was "the failure to make clear that
what I was talking about when I mentioned the containment of Soviet power
was not the containment by military means of a military threat but the
political containment of a political threat." Whatever such hindsight
is worth, Kennan's words were generally taken to-mean political and
military containment on a universal scale.
14 In "Three Comments on the 'X' Article," by W. Averell Harriman,
Arthur Krock, and Dean Acheson, Foreign Policy, No. 7, Summer 1972.
15 In the view of Seyom Brown in The Faces of Power; Constancy and
Change in U.S. Foreign igafrom Truman to Johnson; Columbia University
Press; treTi T6Fg & London 417-r7
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�
Eisenhower succeeded Truman as President on 20 January 1953 and John
Foster Dulles became his Secretary of State with the avowed intention
to go beyond containment toward "dynamic liberation,
in Iran continued to stress the need to contain Soviet power there as
elsewhere.
The U.S. involvement in Iran's oil problems was admittedly
reluctant; we had backed the Iranian government in 1947 when it resisted
the oil concession the
Russians were seeking to arrange in the north.
Our statements at that time probably did much to encourage'the Iranian
as
mood to challenge the British concession as well, andA that challenge
grew into a bitter dispute, the United States found itself caught in
the middle of an argument between its chief European ally and an
underdeveloped Middle Eastern country to which it was providing military
and economic aid. As a result, the U.S. role became not so much one of
mediator but rather as an honest broker attempting to bring two clients
into an agreement for their mutual benefit. Truman's Secretary of
State, Dean Acheson, had proposed16 in July 1951 that the President
send Averell Harriman, his foreign policy adviser, to fehran to reopen
negotiations. Despite violent anti-American rioting by Tudeh the day
he arrived, Harriman did get the two sides talking again, but to little
avail. .When the British brought the case before the Security Council
in October 1951, Mosadeq argued Iran's position before the Council;
afterward, he visited Washington and met with Truman and Acheson, but
their talks came no closer to reaching a basis for settlement.
16 As recounted in Acheson's story of his years at State, Present at
the Creation, W.W. Norton & Co.; New York; 1969; pp. 499-511 and 680-685.
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With the British out of Iran, the United States continued to look
,
for solutions
, _
and proposals involving both the International Bank for
Reconstruction and Development and the American oil industry were put
forth, without success. By the end of 1951 the Conservatives, under
Lhurchill, were back in power in Britain and less willing than Labor
to be frustrated by Iran, and Mosadeq's position, increasingly dependent
on Tudeh support, grew more precarious. By February 1953 he was at
odds with the Shah, and both Britain and the United States were ready
to look for realistic alternative solutions.
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III. COVERT ACTION
A. The Genesis of TPAJAX
The many chroniclers of Central Intelligence Agency misdeeds,
whether in their books, magazine articles, or newspaper columns, have -tong
placed the August 1953 coup that overthrew Premier Mosadeq near the top
of their list of infamous Agency acts. Complete secrecy about the operation
that was-known under the cryptonym of TPAJAX has been impossible to enforce
under existing laws, and enough talkative people, including many Iranians,
ware privy to s.sgraeras of the operation to make it relatively easy for
journalists to reconstruct the coup in varied but generally inaccurate
accounts.17 The point that the majority of these accounts miss is a key
one: the military.coup that overthrew Mosadeq and his National Front
cabinet was carried out under CIA direction as an act of U:S. foreign
policy, conceived and approved at the highest levels of government. It
was not an aggressively simplistic solution, clandestinely arrived at, but
was instead an official admission by both the United States and United
Kingdom that normal -rational methods of international communication and
commerce had failed. TPAJAX was entered into as a last resort.
The target of this policy of desperation, Mohammad Mosadeq, was
neither a madman nor an emotional bundle of senility as he was so often
pictured in the 'foreign press; however, he had become so committed to the
ideals of nationalism that he did things that could not have conceivably
helped his people even in the best and most altruistic of worlds. In
refusing to bargain--except on his own uncompromising terms--with the
17 A number of these are included in Appendix C.
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Anglo-Iranian Oil Company, he was in fact defying the professional pelt-
ticians of the British government. These leaders believed, with good
reason, that cheap oil for Britain and high profits for the company were
vital to their national interests.
to make them respect Iranians, whom company managers and Foreign Office
representatives saw as inefficient, corrupt,
British misjudged their adversaries badly is
that when Iran felt the financial pinch, its
There had been little in their experience
and self-serving. That the
obvious; they were convinced
resolve would crumble, and an
ngrecm-,nt could be worked out to th- tifction of both sides. Henry
Grady, who spent two Unhappy years as U.S. Ambassador to Iran during the
height of the oil dispute, quoted18 the British theme that he had heard'
in so many variations as: "Just wait until the beggars need the money badly
enough--that will bring them to their knees."
In fact, of course, the loss of oil revenue did not bring the Iranians
to their knees; it merely forced them to take the risky steps that increasing-
ly endangered their country's future. It was the potential of those risks
to leave Iran open to Soviet aggression--at a time when the Cold War was
at its height and when the United States was involved in an undeclared war
in Korea against forces supported by the U.S.S.R. and China--that compelled
the United States
executing.TPAJAX.
sent
in planning and
How real were the risks in what Mosadeq was doing? Had the dritish
in the paratroops
and warships, as they were to do a few years later
against the Egyptians at Suez, it was almost certain that the Soviet Union
18
In his article in the 5 January 1952 Saturday Evening Post, entitled
"What went Wrong in Iran?"
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would have occupied the northern portion of Iran by invoking the Soviet-
Iranian Treaty of Friendship of 1921. It was also quite probable that the
Soviet army would have moved south to drive British forces out on behalf
of their Iranian "allies." Then not only would Iran's oil have been
irretrievably lost to the West, but the defense chain around the Soviet
Union which was part of U.S. foreign policy would have been breached.
had
The Soviets would have/the opportunity to achieve the ancient Russian �
dream of a port on the Persian Gulf and to drive a wedge between Turkey.
and India. Under such circumstances: the danger of .a third world war
seemed very real.. When it became apparent that many elements in Iran did
not approve of Mosadeq's continuing gamble or the direction in which he
was pushing their country, the execution of a U.S.-assisted coup d'etat
seemed a more desirable risk than letting matters run their unpredictable
course. Mosadeq was already openly threatening to turn to other sources .
for economic help--the Soviets--if Britain did not meet his demands or if
the United States did not come forth with massive aid to replace his lost
oil revenue. Peacefully or in war, the Soviet Union appeared to be the
only potential beneficiary of Vosadeq's policies.
TPAJAX had its beginnings
in a political action operation designed to change the course of events in,.
I ran .
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the aged Premier was rapidly become a "prisoner of the left" because
of his grOwing reliance on the support of the Soviet-backed Tudeh Party
which had a membership in 1952 of about 25,000 plus many more thousands
of supporters and sympathizers.
20
(b)(1)
(b)(3)
(b)(1)
(b)(3)
a branch
so that he did not reach Washington and report to his new
post as/chief in
NEA/4, NEA Division, Directorate of Plans, until late October
1952.
(b)(1)
(b)(3)
met with Kermit
Roosevelt -
(Chief, NEA Division), the Chief of the Iran Branch of NEA,
the neputy Chief
of NEA and the.
NEA
(b)(1)
(b)(31
in Ilashington,
planning for
(b)(1)
(b)(3)
Iran.
(b)(1)
political action to remove Mosadeq, and NEA represent:itives agreed to .
(b)(3)
study the proposition and to keep policy channels advised. Hig-.level
approval to explore the matter was obtained throush Deportment of State
20 As the orjanization replacing the Communist Party of Iran, outlawed
by Reza Shah, Tueeh had been receiving Soviet financial support end
advice since 1941.
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a CIA NEA Division officer who Was there
channels, / Irecalls attending a decisive meeting2I at
State in company with Kermit Roosevelt at which Gen. W. Bedell Smith
pru.,ided; shortly after he left the Agency to become Under Secretary of
State early in February 1953. Smith's affirmative response to the
question, "Do we go ahead?" was the informal green light that the planners
in NEA Division had been waiting for; his laconic, unprintable answer
"�
was Smith's main contribution to the meeting, at which the reasons for
overthrowing Mosadeq were carefully discussed.
Coincidentally; during Aarch 1953, the Tehran Station reported to
Headquarters
The officially approved reply, after consultation with
Washington, was that the United States was interested but could promise
no specific assistance at that time.
21 No minutes of this meeting are available in 000 files.
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Final official approval of TPAJAX came on 11 July 1953 (WO)
(b)(3)
as an action based on NSC Report 136/1, "U.S. Policy Regarding the Present
Situation in Iran," which had been adopted by the National Security Council
as action NO. 690 and approved by the President on 20 November 1952.
The fact that this decision and the staff work preceding it were
very closely held in Washington is borne out by a memorandum of 10 June
1953 from the Office of Greek, Turkish, and Iranian Affairs (Gil) to the -
Assistant Secretary of State for Near Eastern, South Asian, and African
Affairs recommending policies more supportive of Mosadeq. It reasoned
in Iran
that since condition,(were deteriorating almost to the point of no return
and since an attempt to remove Mosadeq would risk a civil war and would,
even if successful, alienate the Iranian people, we should increase our
financial and technical assistance to Iran in the hope that Mosadeq would
be able to muddle through. The desk officers' position paper recognized .
that increased U.S. aid would, of course, frustrate British policy, which
was to undermine Mosadeq's position. By late June, however, State was
aware of the planned operation, and a further position paper that stipu-
lated certain conditions to be met by the British was prepared on 25
June, as described in the discussion of planning, below.
B. The Planning Phase
To carry out a
operation involving
(b)(1)
(b)(3)
a great deal
of advance planning was necessary,
and in early
'(b)(1)
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24 No documentary evidence of this approval is available in the
CIA Executive Register or the remaining files on TPAJAX.
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!toy Donald N. Wilber,25 an NEA contract consultant who knew Iran well,
(b)(1)
(b)(3)
Their first point of agre.1 t_was that Maj.
Gen. Fazlollah Zahedi26 was the logical choice to head the coup; despite
the fact that hi-S Career balance sheet had nearly as many minuses as
pluses. Zahedils obvious assets were his record as a leader and combat
officer, his devotion to the Shah.� and hi: aggressive desire to chAng,-
the course of his country's destiny. His debits were Many: his wartime
reputation as a pro-Nazi and suspecfed agent who had been arrested by the
British and sent to Palestine was further tainted by charges of corruption:
In addition, he had been out of the army for four years and had only
limited contacts with active duty officers at the regimental and battalion
levels. He nonetheless was regarded by 4ilber7 i(b).(1)
(b)(3)
as the sole Iranian with sufficient
support among Iranian army officers and pro-Shah politicians to be the
central coup figure.
(b)(1)
(b)(3)
25
Donald Newton Wilber was an Agency contract employee
as a consultant in NEA Division and (in 1952
26
In the
1930's he had taken part in archaelogical explorations and excavations
in Egypt, Syria, Afghanistan, and Iran, subsequently writing a number
of surveY-type books on those areas.
See Appendix B for biographic details.
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(b)(1)
(b)(3)
(b)(1)
(b)(3)
(b)(1)
The planning discussions
also took
(b)(3)
�
'
up the assumptions on which the plan would be based. These were: that
Zahedi was the best candidate for coup leader; that the Shah Must be
brought into the operation, against his will if necessary; that the army
would follow the Shah rather than Mosadeq if given a clear-cut choice;
that a genuine legal or quasi-legal basis must be found for the coup;
that public opinion must be aroused against Mosadeq; (b)(1)
(b)(3)
and, that
the new government to be established in power must be guarded from
possible Tudeh countercoup attempts. Tehran Station and Headquarters
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ware kept apprised of these assumptions, with which they did not always
agree. The Station, for example, backed Ambassador Henderson when he �
told Washington that the Shah probably would not act decisively against
:1.0s3eeq, while Headquarters was concerned about finding a possible
substitute for General Zahedi because of the negative aspects of his
seek "religious refuge" was never
reflected the views
with psychological.and propaganda operations was attuned to the
of local customs and traditions.
The proposal that anti-Mosadeq leaders
implefuenttn the field; it probably
primarily concerned (b)(1)
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utilization
/they had
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completed a revision of the plan. Their major change was to concentrate
On building up the size and effectiveness of the anti-Mosadeq forces
rather than on countering actions by the elements supporting the Premier.
(b)(
(b)(
Reduced to its essentials, the plan called for the following sequence
of events, in which timing was of great importance:
The goal of the operation was to replace Mosadeq with a leader whom
;
the Shah and the army would support and who would be willing to negotiate
a reasonable oil settlement that would prevent an economic collapse and
reduce Iran's vulnerability to the Soviet Union.
General Zahedi was
such a man, perhaps the only one who met all the requirements.
30 Also included in Appendix D.
36
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Zahedi would be brought to power through a military coup that would,
because of the Shah's participation, be fundamentally legal. The Shah,
who had been indecisive under the pressure of the oil dispute and Mosadeq's
maneuvering for more power, would be induced to do his part
(b)(1)
(b)(3)
/ The Shah's role would be to qiT-v thrAf.
documents: a royal decree (firman, in Farsi) naming Zahedi as Army Chief
of Staff; another firman appealing to all ranks of the army to carry out
the orders of the new-Chief of Staff; and, an open letter calling on army
officers to support the bearer, General Zahedi. The letter would be used
by Zahedi to reeruit the coup group of officers in key posts that would
enable them to carry out the military objectives of the plan, including the
seizure of army headquarters, Radio Tehran, the army radio station, the
houses of Mosadeq and his principal associates, police and Gendarmerie
�
headquarters, the telephone exchange, the Majlis building, and the
National Bank. Key government figures, army officers, and newspaper_
editors supporting ilosadeq woad be arrested. Special measures would be
prepared. for dealing with the anticipated violent reaction of Tudeh Party
members to Mosadeq's overthrow.
The plan envisaged three different scenarios by which the coup might
be carried out: first, a massive religious protest against the government,
31 The Gendarmerie were a national, paramilitary, rural police, whereas
the National Police were an urban force.
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followed by military action by the army officers loyal to Zahedi; the'
second alternative, taking advantage of the crisis that would develop
at the anticipated moment when Mosadeq would force the Shah to leave
the country, and then starting the military action; or, as the third
alternative, starting the military action the moment that Mosadeq,
32
frustrated by the Shah, presented his resignation and sent the Tudeh-
and National _Front mobs into the street. Under any of these scenarios,
the military action itself was seen as beginning with General Zahedi
assuming the post as Chief of Staff, seizing army headqUarters, and
ordering the arrest of Mosadeq and his compatriots. The Shah would
then appoint Zahedi as Premier, and the Majlis would be called into
session to confirm his appointment.
rhe plan also discussed the se of the press, including propaganda
themes, as well as utilization of the Majlis, the political parties,
religious leaders, and bazaar merchants in carrying out the operation.
Finally, it estimated33 the coup's chances
implications for the United States if it should fail. It was
that
of success and the probable
this plan
CIA to the Department of State
in order to obtain simultaneous high-level approval.
for
Henderson, who was
proposed operation
As a sidelight, it should be mentioned that before Roosevelt left
he briefed U.S. Ambassador to Iran by
in Washington for consultation.
The briefing on the
took place on 6 June 1953 and was attended by General
(b)(1)
(b)(3)
(b)(1)
(b)(3)
32 This was a technique Mosadeq had used before to rally the street mobs
to his support and to intimidate his opposition. It was anticipated that
he would try it again if the Shah put any sort of pressure on him.
33 No formal estimates as to the potential for success of the coup were
prepared by ONE,although that Office was producing special estimates on the
situation in Iran.
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Cabell (the Deputy Director of Central Intelligence), Frank Wisner
Deputy Director for Plans),
conversation notes that the Ambassador stated categorically that the Shah
would not back Zahedi when the time came for action unless extreme pressure
was exerted, possibly including the threat of replacing him. Ambassador
Henderson also warned that the army would not play a major role in the
coup Without the�S-hah's active cooperation, and he urged that an alternate
plan be prepared that would utilize the Amini brothers
Amemo of this
.�
In more
general terms he
(the
� -
The latte-1�
(b)(1Y,
(1D)(3Y,
pointed out the inconsistency of telling the Shah that no more U.S. aid
would go to Iran while Mosadeq remained in power, while at the same time
the Point Four (technical assistance) program was in the process of imple-
menting a $3,400,000 Village Council program. Overall: the Ambassador
was negative about many aspects of the plan, although less so than he had
been when consulted in Tehran.
He agreed to delay his return to Tehran
by arranging a prolonged European visit, thereby adding his absence to
the war of nerves against Mosadeq.
By mid-June, the purpose of the plan was known to some senior Depart-
ment of State officers, and the Office of.Greek, Turkish, and Iranian
Affairs prepared a comment on 25 June for the Secretary of State that in
general approved of the plan--including the assumption of the risks of
failure. However, State set forth two conditions that had to be met:
I) the United States must be prepared to offer immediate and substantial
economic assistance--an estimated $60 million the first year--to the new
government in Iran in order to stabilize the economy and convince the
public tha 'their new government would be able tm do more for them than
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the old one, and 2) the British must give a firm commitment to be
Flexible in approaching the oil settlement and not attempt to force
the new government to accept terms that would alienate public opinion.
To be acceptable, State said, the oil settlement should recognize
nationalization of the oil industry, provide for Iranian control of all
property, installations, and production in Iran, allow the Iranian.
government complete freedom of choice of technical and managerial personnel
as well as freedom in the sales of oil and oil product, and dispose of
the problem of compensation within the framework of the existing nationali-
zation law and on a basis which would not saddle Iran with excessive
indebtedness to the Anglo-Iranian Oil Company.
On 7 July these views were passed to the British by Henry A. Byroade,
Assistant Secretary of State for Near Eastern, South Asian, and African
Affairs, and on 23 July British Ambassador Makins gave Under Secretary of
State W. Bedell Smith a Foreign Office memorandum which in diplomatic
language acceded to the U.S. conditions. The memo set forth the principles
that compensation should be left to the impartial arbitration of an inter-
national tribunal and that terms of a future arrangement must not appear
to provide a reward for the tearing up of contracture] obligations or dis-
turbing world oil prices. The British government would thus be ready to
cooperate with the new Iranian government im trying to reach an agreement,
within the bounds of those two principles. While this answer was obviously
not an across-the-board acceptance of the State conditions, it was not a
specific rejection and was clearly an affirmative answer to the question of
the British taking a reasonable, flexible approach that would not arouse
the Iranian people against the new government.
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C. Putting the Plan into Action
After formal approval came from the British Foreign Office and
the Prime Minister on 1 July and from the U.S. Secretary of State and
the President on 11 July, NEA Division organized itself for the support
of the operation.
The news
that General Zahedi had virtually no military assets of his own was also
painfully confirmed.
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The task of recruiting General Schwartzkopf was assiTled to the former
who on 26 June visited the general, then serving as Administrative
Director, Oepartment of Law and Public Safety, State of New Jersey. Without
revealing specific details, tchwartzkopfs \proposed
was outlined,
role in convincing the Shah/and won the general's complete cooperation,
contingent on the following: 1) that he be allowed to present himself
to the Shah as a major general rather than as a brigadier, for prestige
purposes; 2) that he be fully briefed on the political situation and
all details of the operational plan; and 3) that he be allowed to give
some logical explanation of his trip to Iran to the Governor and the
Attorney General of New Jersey. After a discussion of possible cover
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stories; it was agreed that arrangements would be made for the Government
of Pakistan to invite General Schwartzkopf to visit Karachi for the
purpose of giving advice on police and security matters and that it would
be lo9ical for him to stop and visit old friends in Beirut and Tehran
along his route. .Schwartzkopf also warned \that shortly before
his departure from Tehran in 1946, General Razmara,.then Chief of Staff,
had tried fa-poci-on the Shah's mind against Swartzkopf because of his
resistance to Razmara's desire to absorb the Gendarmerie (over which
Schwartzkopf h:Jd nhal commanA as head of the U.S. t.ivise.rv'mission)
into the army. As a result of this, Schwartzkopf felt his normally
cordial relations with the Shah had become slightly strained by the
time of his departure from Iran in 1948.
A question that arose during The planning phase was whether or not
to proceed with the U.S. Point Four aid program to Mosadeq's Village
Council program (part of ti-ie Agrarian Reform Law of 1952, under which
landlords had to give the government 20% of their profits, 10% to go
back to the peasants and 10% to the Village Council for.health, educa-
tional, and agricultural improvements). Point Four officials had
committed $3,400,000 to the program, which was being exploited in Iran
as evidence of U.S.. support for Mosadeq, and, despite some misgivings,
both Ambassadcr Henderson and the Department of State felt that can-
celling the aid would only serve to irritate Mosadeq and perhaps alert
him to the fact that the United States was beginning to actively oppose
him. Over Station and Headquarters objections, it was finally decided
to proceed with the Village Council commitment.
46
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the Station recommended that William Warne, the Point Four representa-
tive in Tehran who was closely identified with U.S. support for Mosadeq,
be called away from Tehran during the operational phase of TPAJAX,
but it was decided that no adequate excuse could be found for the �
move, which Warne would oppose, and so it was dropped.
D. Involving the Shah
Probably the biggest question mark for TPAJAX planners was
the Shah's role in the coup--not only how he would play it, but would
he even play it at all? They had little reason to be overconfident; for
his indecision and susceptibility to bad advice were notorious. The
Shah had his reasons, however. He had assumed the throne in 1941 when
his father, a. semiliterate strongman, was forced to abdicate by the �
occupying power, Britain and the.U.S.S.R. Leader of a defeated and
humiliated country for the first 411 years of his reign, the young Shah37
attempted to survive by ruling as a constitutional monarch. His very
!xistence was threatened by Tudeh on the left and by Premier Ahmed Qavam
on the right; a British correspondent who interviewed him in 1947
described him as "a very frightened young man." Although Qavam, as a
strong Premier, was in a position to bring the Pahlavi dynasty to a
premature end, he apparently decided to keep the monarchy and took steps
to build up the Shah's popularity, crediting him with recovering Azar-
baijan from the Soviets. Seemingly stimulated by this appearance of
success, the Shah took a more active role as rulec,and in 1947 began to
intervene more vigorpusly in political affairs. The attempted assassina-
_
tion by a Tudeh Party member in 1949 frightened him again, but he survived
37 -
A biography of the Shah is included in Appendix B.
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CAr{
the shots and cast about for some stabilizing factors in his situation.
The U.S. Embassy made this assessment of him in 1951:
The Shah is confused, frustrated, suspicious, proud, and
stubborn, a young man who lives in the shadow of his father.
His fears, questionings,-and indecisiveness are permanent
instabilities of character. Yet, he has great personal courage,'
many Western ideals, and a sincere, though often wavering, desire
to raise and preserve his country. He is, at all times, eager
for and a victim of advice.
How then to convince this mistrusting but gullible ruler of the
soundness and effectiveness of the TPAJAX plan in which his own partici-
.
pation was such a key 'element?. (W(1 )
(b)(3)
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(b
(b
While the coup organization was being pulled together, Mosadeq had
been keeping the political pot boiling. His supporters had held a massive
demonstration on 21 July to mark the second anniversary of the riots that
ousted Qavam and brought Mosadeq in as Premier; Tudeh participation in
the demonstration had been heavy,-pointing up Mosadeq's increasing
reliance on Communist supporters. Of the crowd of more than 50,000
demonstrators estimated to have met in Majlis Square, Tudeh members and
sympathizers probably outnumbered followers of the National Front by
ten to one. During the first week in August, Mosadeq carried out a
national referendum on dissolving the
mous majority, despite the
a
refrendum was illegal.
A
;
unsuccessfully to persuade anti-Mosadeq deputies to resist his efforts
to oust them by taking religious sanctuary, or bast, in the Majlis building.
Mosadeq's reasons for wanting a new Majlis were obvious; his National Front
Majlis that was passed by an enor-
insistence of opposition deputies that such a
attempted
(b)(1)
(b)(3)
3
had lost much of its cohesion since he had quarrelled with Kashani, Baghai,Makkl,
38 Kashani, an influential mullah and political figure, had been a Mosadeq
ally and was the elected Speaker of Majlis; Saghai and Makki were members of
the Premier's original nine-man National Front that had swung th
toward nationalization of the oil industryit(see Appendix A
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and other supporters over his proposed cobstitutional amendments trans-
ferring power from the Shah to the Premier. The National Front, primarily
composed of nationalistic rightwingers, was alarmed by Mosadegls growing
reliance on Tudeh and this became a major issue in the propaganda campaign
(b)(1)
In an attempt to get across to the Iranian (b)(3)
people-the changing attitude of the U.S.. Government toward Mosadeg,
Secretary of State Dulles in his 28 July press conference replied to a
flows;
...:14.1estioen On Iran az
�The growing activities of the illegal Communist Party in
Iran and the toleration of them by the Iranian government has
caused our government concern. rhese developments make it more
difficult to grant aid to Iran.
In the early days of August, Roosevelt
were compelled to build up the pressure on the Shah.
Alterations were
made in the original plan with regard to the firmans the Shah was to
sign; one was to name Zahedi as Chief of Staff, while'the other would
declare illegal the referendum dissolving the Majlls.
� 39 But,
getting
(b)(1)
(b)(3)
(b)(1)
(b)(3)
the actual documents signed was becoming a critical matter.
saw the Shah on 2 August and left the palace believing he had obtained
the Shah's agreement to dismiss Mosadeg and appoint Zahedi as Premier,
but when Roosevelt met with the ruler the following day, he had become
reluctant to act, saying that he was not n.adventurer and could not
take chances like one. Roosevelt's argument was that the government
could be changed in no other way, and that if the Shah did not join
39 3ne of the most rapidly changing facets of the plan was the content
of the firmans; in their final format, there were two--one removing
Mosadeq as Premier, the other appointing General Zahedi in his place.
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army to oust Mosadeq, either a Communist Iran or another
Korean-type conflict was inevitable. These alternatives the United
States. was not prepared to accept.
At this meeting, the Shah asked for direct assurance from President--
Eisenhower that he approved of the Shah's taking the initiative Against
Mosadeq, but before this could be passed to Washington, the President
fortuitously inserted an item in his speech to the Governors, Conference
in Seattle on 4 August40 to the effect that the United States could not sit
idly by and watch Iran fa:: behind the Ir.:3n Curtain. noosevelt Used the
coincidence of this speech .by telling the Shah that the President's comment
on Iran had been made to satisfy him, but the ruler continued to balk. On
8 August, the Shah, still irresolute,-told Roosevelt that he would send a
message of Encouragement to the army officers involved, then go to the
palace at Ramsar on the Caspian and let the army act, apparently without
his official knowledge. If that action were successful, he would name
Zahedi as Premier.
but the
(b)(1)
(b)(3)
Shah said that while he approved of the planned action, he would not sion
1 any documents.
(b)(1)
(b)(3)
Under this extreme pressure, the Shah finally agreed to sign the papers,
see Zahedi personally, and then leave for Ramsar. The next day he did
meet with the general, but the firman
preparing were not yet ready to be signed. The Shah went on to Ramsar,
after prorliising to sign the decrees as soon as they were brought to him.
40 As reported in The New York Times for
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1953.
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RoosevzAt
!then altered- the plan one final time by
deciding that one fi rman should dismiss Mosadeq from the Premier's post
rnd tinf. nther name Zahedi as his successor.
(b)(1)
(b)(3)
(b)(3)
E. The First Attempt -- and Failure
The Shah's decrees were now in the hands of the coup group, arld
the next Step was to implement the military action plan as soon as possible.
(b)(1
(b)(3
One point seems clear, although the exact details are missing--the
initial coup attempt Was betrayed. Rumors of a coup to be staged by the
army had been in the air for some time, and the Iranians' desultory view
of security and their tendency to be talkative were notorious, but according
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to Roosevelt, it was probably Colonel Naeeri, chief of the secret police,
who told Chief of Staff Riahi that the coop was coming the night of 15
Auyst. General. Riahi,/
had been informed of the plot by 1700 on the 15th;
General Kiani,
where he was arrested and held by Colonel Nasiri and other coup officers.
(W(1)
(b)(3
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What happened to the other coup officers with.assigned missions? d(b)(1)
(
number of them heard the news that the coup was blown and so .did nothinb)(3)
g.
Others were frustrated by the precautions General Riahi took when he learned
(b)(1)
the coup was coming that night.]
General Batmangelich, who was to have captureN3)
the Chief of Staff's headquarters, turned back when he saw a large number
of troops and tanks surrounding it. General Guilanshah, who was with
Batmangel ich, said that after their abortive attempt on the headquarters
they rode around town looking the situation over until about 0230, when
they separated.
(b)(1)
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(b)(1)
(b)(3)
The first coup attempt--a conventional military takeover, reinforced
by the Shah's signed orders--had taken less than 12 hours, from Saturday
night, 15 August, until early in the morning of Sunday the 16th. As the
chronology of TPAJAX41 shows, the next three days were filled with con-
f�rion. M,,cArieq's forces believed that they had crushed the thing they
most feared--an army takeover on behalf of the Shah. Their reaction was
to mop up on their remaining enemies and to exploit their victory to the
fullest. Monday and Tuesday, the 17th and 13th, the.Tudeh Party seized
the spotlight, rioting and demonstrating in the streets in a-wild outburst
of antimonarchical feeling, while Roosevelt and his men waited their
chance to reverse things. The second, and winning, phase of the operation
was not to come until Wednesday, the 19th.
F. Turning Defeat Around
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dissolving the 17th Majlis and promising early elections for the next
Majlis. Later that afternoon; the Station learned from the radio that
the Shah :1;ad flown to Baghdad. As Roosevelt said when he returned to
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At noon on 16 August, Radiolehran broadcas,t a statc:iriant frcxm :40sadeti(b)(1)
(b)(3)
Headquarters after the coup: "He just took off. He never communicated
with us at all--just took off." The immediate Station reaction was to
try to arrange for the Shah to broadcast to his people from Baghdad as
soon as possible. Headquarters was asked to have the Department of State,
through the U.S. Ambassador in Iraq, press the Shah to take an aggressive.
stand about the events in Tehran. State, however, was firmly opposed to
any U.S. effort to contact the Shah,1
The next day, Monday the 17th,
the Shah did make a number of statements that were broadcast over the Baghdad
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radio, insisting that he had not abdicated, that he was confident of
the loyalty to him of the Iranian people, and that he had indeed dismissed
Premi2r Mosadeq and appointed Zahedi under his constitutional prerogatives.
On his own initiative, U.S. Ambassador to Iraq Burton Berry had seen the
Shah on Sunday night, the 16th, and had suggested some ideas for the
forthcoming statement that by happy coincidence were very much in line
with Station thinking.
Foreign riinister Fatemi, who had been released at dawn on the 16th
along with the rest of the handful of prisoners taken in the coup attempt,
held a press conference at 1400 that afternoon in which he implicated.the
Court and blamed the Imperial Guard for planning the Coup. He said that
his own views Would be found in an editorial in his paper, Bakhtar Emruz
which was also read over Radio Tehran at 1730--it was a long, inflammatory,
and savage attack on �the Shah and his dead father. Its broadcast and
subsequent printing was credited with doing much to stir up the Tudeh-led
anti-Shah mobs that raged through Tehran on 17 and 13 August. At the
same time, the violence of its tone and language aroused much public
sympathy for the Shah. Fatemi spoke again at 1930 to the crowds massed
in Majlis Square, as did a number of pro-Mosadeq Majlis deputies. The
Shah was sharply attacked by every speaker; there were insistent demands
for his abdication, and the people were told for the first time that he
had left the country.
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On Monday the 17th, Radio Tehran began broadcasting lists of those (W(1)
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involved in
the
coup
attempt
Rumors that these officers were were to be hanged on a large gallows
reportedly being constructed were widely circulated. Fatemi continued to.
rail against the Shah in Bakhtar.Emruz, and his editorial on the 17th said,
in part: "0 traitor Shah, you shameless person, you have completed the
criminal history of the Pahlavi reign. The people want to drag you from
behind your desk to the gallows." By mid-morning, Tudeh-led mobs were in
the streets of Tehran, tearing down statues of the Shah and Reza Shah,
defiling them, and dragging them through the streets. When Ambassador
Henderson arrived fromBeirut, as scheduled, he drove back to the Embassy
past the empty Fipda-staisl of the royal statues of which only the broken_
bronze boots remained.
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Roosevelt had hoped that it would be possible to emphasize the (b)(1)
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religious aspects of the demonstration to be held the 19th, but if this
was to be done, the' mullahs wanted to hold'it on Friday, 21 August, which -
Was a religious fe"Stivpl day. For a number of reasons not the least of
which was the widespread rumor .that the arrested officers were to be hung
on the 20th, the operation could not be held off the. two extra days the
religious leaders wanted.
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44
Richard Cottam, in Nationalism in Iran, University of Pittsburgh Press,
1964, described (p.37) the bazaar mob in some detail, as follows: "Along
with the mullahs and frequently closely allied with them are the profes-
sional mob leaders. These men typically center their activities in a
varzesh ah (a-thletic club). There are many varieties of varzeshgahan,
some of them respectable clubs which not only serve as centers for
athletes but also for-other valuable group activities. 'Jut the varsesh-
gahan of the mob leaders are centers for athletic young toughs known as
chaqu keshan, who can be hired for for any kind of corrupt or terroristic
activity... .when a sizable political demonstration is desired, the mob
leaders purchase the participation of large numbers of unskilled laborers.
In 1952 observers claim to have seen workers demonstrating for the
Communists, for the royalists, and for the Mosadeqist National Front on
successive days."
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In Washington, the Department of State and Headquarters had gotten (b)(1)
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the bad news. On the Pith Roosevelt had sent two messages to tell Head-
quarters that the first attempt had failed but that there were still
He did not furnish a great deal of detail on just
how bad things were, since he was well aware that the reaction would be
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to cut the losses, gat everyone out, and scrub the show. His requests for,
State Department help ir getting Ambassador Berry in Baghdad to instruct
the Shah on what to say in his speech there were, as noted earlier, turned
down. State indicated that in the absence of any satisfactory indication
of possible success of the coup, the United States wished to avoid
assuming responsibility for urging statements on the Shah beyond those
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he himself was disposed to make. Further,
lacking more satisfactory indications than
from.Roosevelt's messages that there was a
bility of decisive action in Iran,"
AUMINISTRATIVE - WJi:KIG-PAPER
the Department said that
it had.been able to d raw
"real and significant possi-
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Tuesday, the 18th, became a day of waiting. The Shah and Queen
Soroya flew to Rome from Baghdad that morning; when he arrived at 1500,
he made additional statements to the press but did not issue a call to
action by the forces supporting him. In Tehran, bands of Tudehites still
roamed the streets, and a mob sacked the head uarters of the Pan-Iran
Party
and small Tudeh and
National Front mobs fought each other. The secret police attempted to
prevent the publication of opposition newspapers, but a number of them,
including Dad and Shahed, were able to get on the streets with replicas
of the Shah's firmans. The Tudeh Party newspaper blamed the coup attempt
on Anglo-American intrigue and called for a democratic 'republic to replace
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cleric in Qom to declare �a holy war against the agents of communism,
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the monarchy. Mosadeq's spokesmen on Radio Te'bran announced that a
100,000-rial reward would be paid for information on the whereabouts of
Ge:leral Zahedi and that all demonstrations were banned. General Riahi
addressed a meeting of all senior officers of the Tehran garrison at
the lecture hall of the Military School and told them in very strong
terms that they should remain loyal to the government.
Despite the ban on demonstrations, there 1..qs continued fighting
in the streets on the evening of 18 August,
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Mosadeq's security forces were sent out to clear the streets, and their
-operations took on a strong anti-Tudeh tone as they beat up demonstrators
and forced them to shout pro-Shah slogans. .Belatedly realizing what was
happening, Tudeh leaders went out into the streets to try to talk the
demonstrators into going home, but the excesses of two days of anti-Shah
rioting had already done their damage.
For the Station, there was good news from Kermanshah. Farzanegan
finally returned from there early Wednesday morning after having had
car trouble
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He reported that Colonel Bakhtiar was willing to march on Tehra030)
dOinitive results came from the attempt to persuade the leading S hi
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although the pro-Shah newspapers had been prepared to exploit, the story,
if possible.
And, Headquarters sent a message that Tuesday evening that
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said in blunt terms that in the absence of strong recomnendations to the
contrary from Roosevelt and Henderson, the operation against Mosadeq
should be discontinued.
To the men on the scene, however, the operation seemed far from
hopeless. There were strong indications of a resurgence of support for
the Shah, bolstered by the propaganda efforts of Station agents. Tudeh.
violence and-demands for a republic were putting the continued life of
the monarchy into the hands of the army and of the people of Tehran.
The uitim.te choice was to bc theirs,
�
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Early on the morning of the 19th, pro _Shah groups began to gather
in the bazaar area in south Tehran. Many of the people assembling were
undoubtedly those that Kashani was paying 200 tomans (2,000 rials, or
about $2.65 at the exchange rate of 75 rials to the dollar) a head to
be in the streets, but there were also many others who had been stirred
up by Tudeh actions and who were looking for leadership.
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As the various groups of demonstrators moved northward out of south
Tehran,45 they merged as they reached Sepah Square, where they met the
� troops sent to turn them back. The soldiers fired hundcads of Shots over
45
The map of Tehran included as tAppendix,shows the area through
which the demonstration moved and its targets.
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their heads, but whether the order to fire into the crowd was never
given or was ignored, they did not shoot into the mob. Sensing that
the army was with them, the demonstrators not only began to move faster
but took on a festive, holiday atmosphere. As Roosevelt said later, it
had become a mob wholly different from any seen before in Tehran; it wa-s.
full of well-dressed, white-collar people, carrying pictures of the Shah
and shouting, "Zindebah, Shah!"(Long live the Shah). Then, the troops
began to join in the demonstration.
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Troops from the Imperial Guard, which had been disbanded-after its involve-
ment in the 15 August coup attempt, had gathered, and truckloads of soldiers
began driving through the streets, shouting and waving pictures of the
Shah. Drivers kept their lights on, as they had been asked to do as a
sign they supported thealah.
By mid-morning, after the demonstrators had reached Sepah Square
and fanned out into the center of the city, General Riahi reported to
Mosadeq that he no longer controlled the army, but the Premier told him
to hold firm. Mosadeq's house, a prime target of the demonstrators, was
being defended by Colonel Momtaz' battalion.
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Radio Tehran was a key target, since it would not only be able to
broadcast the news of the success of the Shah's forces in the capital
but would also help convince the provinces to join in supporting the
Zahedi government. It was important, also to get it in unsabotaged
condition, ready to broadcast. During the morning hours on the 19th
it had been broadcasting cotton prices, then .switched-to recorded music
uninterrupted by news bulletins. Shortly before 14300 it suddenly went
-. �
off the air, apparently as the pro _Shah troops and demonstrators too
control of the building in a .short, sharp struggle. Mnen it resumed � .
broadcasting, aFter a short period ofutechnical difFicuities,u-all that
could be heard was a confused babble of ha7py voices._
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Zahedi
.
was brought out put in the tanis and taken
. _
to Radio Tehran, where he made his speech. In it he promised to restore
the rule of law, individual freedom, and freedom of assembly, and he
added some popular items such as raising wages, cutting the cost of
living, providing free medical treatment, and building more roads. The
speech was recorded and broadcast again that night.
Although the Kermanshah division did not reach the capital until after
the excitement was over, they had entered Hamadan enroute just as the
Tudeh Party there was staging a large pro-Mosadeq demonstration, which
Bakhtiar's troopers ended in short order. In the wake of the coup,
Zahedi named Bakhtiar as military governor of Tehran, where he enforced
martial law and was instrumental in the year that followed in removing
hundreds of Tudeh members and sympathizers from the army officer corps.46
Mosadeq's forces put up more than token resistance at Staff. Headquarters
and at the Premier's house, but they were quickly overwhelmed. newspaper
46
This experience led to Bakhtiar eventually being appoint-'4in 1956 as
the first chief of Iran's newly formed counterintelligence oranization,
SAVAK (Sazeman-e Etala'at va Amnyat-e Keshvar).
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accounts of the coup, in particular ;'.ennett Loves dispatch to The New
which was based on local newspaper accounts,
York Times, grossly exaggerated the casualties. Love's story//said that
more than 300 people were killed or wounded, that Mosadeq's house was
stormed by Sherman tanks which in turn were battered by shells from
loyalist tanks, and that Colonel Momtaz, who led the defenders at the
Premier's house, was "torn to pieces" by the mob. "Torn to pieces" was
a favorite of Love's; he used it to descHbe what happened to Foreign
Minister Fatemi in his newspaper office. In fact, however, casualties
of the coup were relatively light consideiing the number of people
involved; the official toll was 43 dead and 35 wounded, and neither./
Momtaz nor Fatemi was even scratched, let alone dismembered. And MOsadeq,
whom the journalists variously described-as slipping up a ladder and over
his back wall in his pajamas or lying weeping in bed (also in.pajamas)
when the troops burst in, was not even in his house when it was attacked..
He had gone next door and taken temporary refuge with U.S. Point Four chief
William Warne, who was somewhat embarrassed to have a deposed Premier on his
hands, ev,in for a brief period. Over the next few days, Mosadeq and other
senior officials of his government turned themselves in or were arrested.
News that began to trickle in from the provinces after Zahedi's
broadcast on Wednesday afternoon was uniformly 000d.- Radio Tabriz reported---
;
that Azerbaijan was in the hands of the army, while the station at Isfahan
came on the air at 1300 with strong statements in support of Zahedi and
the Shah. Kerman proclaimed its loyalty to the .new government at 2000,
and :ieshed, though not immediately heard from, had changed sides as soon
as it heard the news
wrapped Up
officers wero,placed in command of all
from Radio Tehran. TPAJAX'S final details were
under their -direction, loyal (W(1)
(b)(3)
units of the Tehten_gerriton
the seizure of key military targets was completed, and the arrest lists
were carried out. The nation was under martial law, a curfew was put into
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effect, and at 2200, Radio Tehran signed off for the niyht.
In Rome, the Shah was preparing to return to Iran in triumph On
22 August. In a formal statement, he said: "It was my people who have
shown me that they-ere faithful to the monarch)and that 21-.2- years of false.
propaganda....my country did not want the Communists and therefore has
been faithful to me."
IV. The Aftermath of Victory
A successful TPAJAX left behind a good deal of debris
to clean up, plus not a few complications.
Roosevelt himself left Iran shortly after the coup.
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Theyvere curious, of course,
as to why there had been so little reporting from the Station and from
Roosevelt during the three days after the failure of the first attempt
to overthrow Mosadeq. .Roosevelt explained frankly and at length that if
he and his men had reported what they were doing,
would have thought they were cray and told them to stop at c;nae.
Washington (b)(1)
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4 p
had they reported in detail the reasons why they felt 'justified in taking
the actions they were taking, they Would have had no time to carry them
out. Therefore, their course was to act, while reporting as little as
possible and assuming that they have very little more to lose and every-
thing to win. EveryOne recognized, of course, that if the outcome had
been different, a substantially different attitude toward Roosevelt's
decision and actions might have emerged in many quarters.
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The Oashqai had dislik56 Mosadeq, of course, because of his reliance on
the Tudeh, but they also retained a deep-seated animosity toward the
Shah, whose father had brutally pacified the tribe.'!hen the vote of
the tribal council was taken, it was by a very narrow margin in favor
of peaceful acceptance of Zahedi, despite the sentiw?.nts of Khosrow
and the other Clashqai khans for armed rebellion.
\
49
It was feared that in the confusion of the coup the tribesmen
might try to take advantage of the situation by a revolt against
the new gov'ernment. While the army might have been able to put down
such a revolt in short order, the situation could have enhanced Tudeh's
chances to stage a countercoup.
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When Roosevelt was debriefed at Headquarters(
on
28 August, he noted that except for an attempt by'some Qashgai to disarm
certain Gendarmerie posts, Shiraz was very quiet throughout the coup.
After Zahedi was securely in control, several of the other tribes volun-
teered to take steps to control the Qashai themselves if necessary rather
than have the army sent in after them. Despite their anti-Shah feelings,
had
however, the Q.ashoiai /aCcepted the coup with as good grace as they could
muster.
As in every f_ight, there were losers. Both,Nohammad Mosadeq and
Brig. Gen. Taqi Riahi were indicted under Article 317 of the Military
Criminal Procedure which states:
Anyone who devises a plot with a view to either overthrowing
the foundation of the State, or the succession of the Monarch, or
instigates 'the people to arm themselves against the power of the -
Monarchy shall be sentenced to death.
The verdict of the Military Court of First Instance and of the Mili-
tary Court of Revision against the two accused was guilty, and the
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punishment was set at three years of solitary imprisonment for Mosadeq
and three years of imprisonment with hard labor for General Riahi.49
As for the other key figures in the coup, General Zahedi served as
Premier until April 1955, when he left Tehran for medical treatment in
West Germany. His relationship with the Shah whose throne he had helped
to save was a stormy one; they quarrelled in February 1954 regarding the
elections, and Zahedi angrily objected to what he termed the Shah's
"childish vacillation" over official appointments. He and the Shah were
also at dds over General BAtmahgelichA whom 7ahedi wished to dismiss
from the post of army Chief of Staff." In general, the Shah resented
any attempt by Zahedi to take credit for the coup. In his opinion, he
was the primary motivating factor and Zahedi- was only his chosen instru-
ment. He had appointed Zahedi as.a strong man who could do the job that
had to be done; but, once Zahedi had done it, the Shah reverted to the
monarch's traditional dislike and fear of a strong man. The general's
son, Ardeshir, fared better; he married Princess Shanaz, the Shah's
daughter by his first marriage in November 1956 (they were later divorced),
and he is currently serving as Iranian Ambassador to the United States.
49 A summary of the court proceedings and the verdicts is included
as Appendix F.
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Col. Abbas Farzanegan, who played such a key role in building the
military organization to carry out the coup, was promoted to brigadier
general. and became Deputy Minister of Posts, Telephone, and Telegraph
before taking over as Minister in April 1954. He retired from the army
when the Zahedi government fell a year later, moving to the United States
until 1959 when-he again returned to Iran. He served briefly as governor
of Isfahan and then occupied a series of ambassadorial posts that included
Kuwait, Norway, and the Netherlands.
(b)(1)
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Col. Nematollah Nasiri, the Imperial Guard commander, was. also
promoted to brigadier general for his loyal-service during the coup. He
became chief of SAVAK, the National Intelligence and Security Organization,
in 1965 and was made a general in 1971.
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Looking back on TPAJAX after 21 years, the crucial moments obviously
were in those
Ifour long days when the operation hung
in the balance, shifting toward disaster but ready to swing toward
victory if the right breaks came. As it turned out, Roosevelt was
fortunate enough-to get at least two very important breaks. The first,
lay in the fact that the Tudeh demonstrations of 17 and 18
ugut wcnt much too far. They degenerated into vicious anti-Shah
riots, and the acts of violence and desecration turned .a great many
people against Mosadeq and his allies. Alarmed by the open threats to
the monarchy and disturbed by the Tudeh clamor for a socialist republic
the people and the army rallied to-the pro-Shah demonstratorsLj
(b)(1)
on the morning of the 19th. The second
(b)(3)
(b)(1)
break came though the tactical mistakes made by Mosadeq's followers;
his Chief of Staff, General Riahi, had almost the whole story of the
upcoming military coup attempt by late afternoon on 15 August, hours
(b)(3)
Jo
before the action started. All he had to" was to order the police and
military security forces to start ar-resting officers suspected of being
Iinvolved in the plot, and the coup would never have started.
The failure
of Iranian security in general was part of this break. Roosevelt and
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involvement (he cited his suspicions
Riahi had some evidence of U.S.
after
the First coup attempt failed), yet his police and military allowed
American cars to come and go at will, unstopped and unsearched.'
V. The Long View of the Covert Action in Iran
The long-term impact of TPAJAX did not, as Churchill hoped, enable
the West to turn thiags around in the Middle East; over the years since
1953, Western influence in that region has steadily declined. But the
course of Iranian history was clearly changed by the events of 19 August.
While by no means a dedicated Western ally, Iran retains its fear of the
Soviets, and the enormous wealth that it has gained from the increased
value of oil in the 1970's has been used and is still being used to build
�
strong military forces not only for self-defense but to support Iranian
aspirations for dominance in the Persian Gulf as well. But, a powerful
army, a modern air force, and well-equipped navy cannot be built in a
vacuum. Changes in. the country's social and economic structure to
improve national-health and educational levels were necessary to provide
adequate manpower for these forces. The Shah's program to modernize
his country has also made land reform one of its key programs; by 1963
the Crown lands had been sold to the peasants living on them, and by
1971 the government claimed that the task of redistributing the land
owned by the wealthy elite was complete. There is little question as
to who is running Iran, of course; the Shah has a monopoly of political
power, and although parliamentary elections and procedures may furnish
the window-dressing of democratic government it is the Shah alone who
determines national policy. The success of the ghite Revolution--that
is, reform and change directed from the top--has solidified the foundations
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of the throne that seemed so shaky and insecure in the violent days
of 1952 and 1953.
.TPAJAX was also to have a very lasting effect outside Iran,
however. It changed, for a time at least, some of the methods of
conducting and carrying out U.S. foreign policy. The success of
covert action in Iran, where the course of history was altered and
a potehtial-alli-a d its valuable petroleum assets kept from slipping
into the Communist world by U.S. backing for a military coup, predis-
A " s h1Ahhprc to Annly the
technique elsewhere. Had Roosevelt's
luck not held and had 19 August turned from a successful gamble into a
nightmare of disaster, the United States might well have avoided commit-
ting its covert �action forces to assist in the overthrow of the pro-
Communist government in Guatemala in 1954. Arid there is reason to doubt
that the attempt in 1961 to overthrm4 Castro's revolutionary government
in Cuba would ever have been planned and staged without the successes
in Iran and Guatemala glittering in the background to remind the makers
of policy that he who-does not venture has scant hope of gain.
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Whose Oil? An Abbreviated History of the Anglo-Iranian Oil Dispute, 1949-53
In 1372, the then Shah of Persia, Naser ad-Din, in return for much-
needed cash, gave to Baron Paul Julius de Router a concession to exploit
all his country's minerals (except for gold, silver, and precious stones),
all its forests and uncultivated land, and all canals and irrigation
works, as well as a monopoly to construct railways and tramways. Although
the resulting uproar, ,--e-s-?,4r-ially from neighboring Russiainused this
sweeping concession to be cancelled, de Reuter, who was a German Jew with
British citizenship, persisted and by 1889 regained two parts of his
original concession--the operation of a bank and the working of Persia's
mines. Under the latter grant, de Reuter's men explored for oil without
great success, and the concession expired in 1399, the year the Baron died.
Persian oil right.+en passed to a British speculator, William Knox
01Arcy, whose first fortune had been made in Australian gold mines. The
purchase price of the concession was about 50,000 pounds, and in 1903
the enterprise began to sell shares in 'The First Exploitation Company."
Exploratory drilling proceeded, and by 1904, two producing wells were in.
Shortly thereafter,Ainterest in oil was sharply stimulated by the efforts
of Admiral Sir John Fisher, First Lord of the Admiralty, to convert the
Royal Navy. from burning coal to oil. As a result, the Burmah Oil Company
sought to become involved in oersian oil and, joining with D"krcy and Lord
Strathcona formed the new Concessions Syndicate, Le!, which endured until
1907 when Burmah Oil bought D'Arcy out for 200,000 pounds cash and 900,000
pounds in shares. Burmah's first gusher came in a 1,130 feet in May 1903,
near Masjed Soleyman, and a year later, after some complicated financial
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dealings in London, the Anglo-Persian Oil Company (APOC) was born,
incorporating the shares and rights of the earlier concessionaires.
The company chose Abadan as the site of its refinery and made local
fi
phIstoi
arrangementsvrfor 'Its security with both the Shiekh of Mohammerah and
the Bakhtiari tribal khans; the former was paid an annual rental and
promised continued autonomy from Tehran, while the latter were to
receive 3% of net oil revenues (to be paid out of the Persian government's
share of 16%).
When Winston Churchill became First Lord of the Admiralty in 1911,
his persistent prodding changed the Royal llavy over to oil. To ensure
51c7..)
asource of cheap oil the British government became a majovhareholder
in the APOC in 1914, adding 2 million pounds in capitalization and signing'
a 30-year contract for fuel oil at cut rates
(Churchill wrote in 1923 that
this contract had saved Britain no less thar7.5 million- on its
wartime oil purchases).
Differences as to how profits were to be shared between the Persian
4Yerld 1.,i,r.
government and the APOC began after/ -.4. The company claimed that
k
Persia's share of the profits applied to the earnings of the three sub-
sidiaries actually operating in Persia (based on Article 1 of the D'Arcy
concession, which
defined its limits as "throughout the whole extent of
the country"). Persia claimed itwas entitled to a share of the profits from
all operations, including extracting, producing, refining, and marketing
its oil, wherever these operations might take place. rhere were also
problems over British claims for wartime damage to pipelines by-Bakhtiaris
incited by Gerlan and Turkish agents. The British attempt to negotiate a
settlement calling for new profit-sharing arrangements fell through in
1920, and the relationship tottered along under the old agreement until 1333.
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ply% S
In 1921, Reza Than, a colonel V the Iranian cossacks -(Fee,ed.
in i',79 by...1111&-a.f.44.6.-1.0.-1..merl 1,y rts
7,414r-itztf-xttITIri-s4-t1, seized power by deposing the
Nte Irrre nt- al"tL
last Qajar Shah. He visited Abadan after becoming Shah himself in 19250
A
and his account of the trip gave warnings of things to come. He noted
that of the 29,000 employees in the oilfields and refinery, 6,000 were.
foreigners, and he expressed concern that so few Persians were being
trained for higher level posts. He also saw that the British staff
enjoyed an obviously higher standard of living than the others, and that
while the refinery area appeared prosperous, the surrounding districts
had not felt any positive impact from this major industry in their area.
Finally, he was disturbed by a manager's description of cutting down pro-
duction in order not to upset world markets--but at a loss to Persia.
So, Persian dissatisfaction continued to build up until November 1932,
when the government notified the company that the D Arcy concession, signed
under the Qajar regime, was annulled and a new concession would be granted
on the basis of equity and justi5,4� -This new concession was not easily
arrived at--the 3ritish government referred the annulment to the League of
Nations, whose Council sent Or. Eduard Bener of Czechoslovakia to reconcile
the two sides. Tydo legal points were thus established that were to affect
the later dispute in 1951: the right to annul the concession was recog-
nized, and the League accepted the viewpoint of the British that such a
case col,r1 be brought to the Council under Article 15 of the Covenant (which
provided For a hearing on disputes between members that were likely to lead
to a rupture in diplomatic relations and for the solution of which no legal
recourse existed). The two parties finally worked out a new concession
agrezrotnt that was ratified by the Majlis (the 1-0t-te-r4o-u-s-e---e-F�t4h-tPersi an
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parliament) and si,jned by Reza Shah on 23 May 1933; it extended the life
of the concession to 1993 and set up a new royalty basis. By its terms
Persia would receive 4 shillings on every ton of oil sold in Persia or
exported, plus 20% of the dividends ove4671,250 distributed to
shareholders, with a minimum dividend ofS750,000 ;per year. To
avoid Persian taxation, the company agreed to pay a small additional
royalty_on tonnage, and it would continue to pay British taxes out of
gross profits.
It was the oil business as usual until the summer of 1941 when
Germany invaded the Soviet Union. Because German influence in Iran (as
Persia was renamed in 1935 by Reza Shah) had grown significantly and
because the country was the best route for Allied supplies going to the
beleaguered Soviets, the Allies determined to send in occupation forces.
Russian troops took over the five northern provinces, 3ritish forces
went into the south, and the area around Tehran was neutralized. Following
1-Norjays v11�1 Ca 1I,se.d vt t.
three days of futile and desultory resistance, theAShah abdicated in favor
4uS.
of his young son, Mohammad Reza Pahlavi; Iran was an occupied country
until 1946. Abadan continued to Rroduce petroleum products for the Allies,
but the Soviets took advantage of the situation and attempted to obtain an
oil concession in the north. In late 1944, the Soviets werezdvised by
Premier
Sa'ed that the cabinet had ruled out the granting of further
concessions until after the war. When pressure was applied through the
leftwing parties, Sa'ed resigned, at which point the Majlis passed a bill
Introduced by Or. Mohammad Mosadeq forbidding any discussion of or signing
agreements for an oil concession with any foreign representatives. The
bill passed, despite CoAmunist opposition, thereby blocking a Russian con-
Cession, but in the course oF the debate the possibility o revokin.;he
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AX 3C concession was seriously raised. Despite the law, Premier Qavam
in April 1946 signed an agreeMtnt yiving the U.S.S.R. an oil concession
in northern Iran. The Majlis refused to ratify the concession, and in
the bill rejecting it, the legislators declared that it was forbidden to
grant any concession to export nil to foreigners; further, they instructed
the government to look into possible violation of the rights of the people
in connectiOn with the southern oil concession held by the AlOC.
With the wartime occupation over, the 3ritish oil managers began
tu have !abut troubles.
rhe 1946 yeheral strlke�was settled With a pay
raise, but this was only the start. In 1947 the Iranian Ministry of
Finance sent a delegation to London to discuss money due the Iranian
government, various employee grievances, reduction of foreign staff, ex-
pansion of local distribution facilities, and the AIDC policy of concen-
trating refining activities outside Iran. To these complaints, the
company, obviously feeling secure in the legality of its concession,
was relatively unresponsive.
The law of 22 October 1947 instructed the government to open dis-
cussions with the AIOC to secure the nation's rights to its oil resources.
These "discussions" started more than 5 years of bargaining and debating,
proposal and counterproposal, charge and countercharge, until they eventual,ly
reached the Secu'rity Council of the United Nations. -The Iranians led off
in August 1943 with a 50-page memorandum that listed 25 points that Were
to be discussed with the company in implementing the 1947 law. The main
items on this list included 3ritish taxation of Iran's share of oil profits,
Iran's ultimate rights to AIN installations outside the country at the end
of the concession (it had already been promised those in Iran), reduction
, cluv:.Tort
in the number of foreign employees, the of the concession (by 1993)
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the Iranians felt, they would have little oil left in the yround), the
royalty basis, and tax and custom exemptions. Negotiations with company
representatives began the following month, continuing intermittently
thereafter. Shortly before the 16 January 1949 attempt by a Tudeh Party
member to assassinate the Shah at Tehran University, Premier Sa'ed identi-
fied higher profits and more Iranian employees as his main goals in these
discussions; he pointed out that Iran's oil royalties for 1947 were just
overa7 million whereas the Ain had paid some1,15 million in
3ritish income taxes'.' Specifically Iran wanted control of the company's
operations as well as a 50-50 split of the net profits. On 5 May 1949,
AIOC chairman Sir William Fraser came to Tehran with a draft of the
"Supplemental Agreement," and this draft was basically the agreement sisped
by the government and cnmpany on 17 July. -The royalty payment was increased
from 4 to 6 shillings per ton, and Iran was to get 20g of the distributed
profits (with a minimum of;2.5 million ) and general reserve terms
AIX i4rvv�E'YfCark exeolt"1" t�de--1�Q
well short of the 50-50 sharing Iran wanted and whichAAramco wels'in the
process of agreeing to give Saudi Arabia. The agreement was sent to the
Majlis on 19 July, and debate began on 23 July, lasting 4 days before the
15th Majlis formally went out of existence. The oil agreement bill as well
as the new election bill were left over to the next hajlis.
Elections for the 16th Majlis ban in the fall of 1949 and were
/1/41.11-rovis-1ho
finally completed in March 1950, with Dr. Mosadcq and his eightAfollowers
leading in the balloting in Tehran. Ali Mansur became Premier, and in June
.(01 51 d
the oil agrei-,aleilt was turned ovcr to the 19-man special oil co.mission that
A
included llosadeq and five other members of the National Front. Six days
later, the Shah dismissed Mansur and appointed General Ali Razmara, former
Chief of Staff, as Premier. The commission reported back to the Aajlis Eh
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APPENDIX ,A
that the agreement was not adequate to secure the rights of Iran
Qnd that it was opposed to its ratification. The Minister of Finance then
withdrew the agreamcnt, announcing that negotiations for increased royalties
would be reopened with the AIOC.
1951
In Februal the AIOC offered Iran an agreement similar to Aramcols�
including the 50-50 profit sharing, but it was too late; the National Front
was intent on nationalizing oil and it dominated the Majlis. The oil
commission indicated ittoofavored that course, despite
the experts appointed by Razmara to study the feasiblity
rhe experts had pointed out Iran's lack of technical and
the report from
of nationalization.
financial expertise,
plus the facts that the concession could not legally be cancelled, that Iran
would be liable for up t4500 million lin compensation, that haavy
losses in foreign exchange and prestige would result, and that it would be
unwise to antagonize Britain. On 7 March General Razmara was shot and
killed by a member of Fedayan Islarr. a rightist terrorist grouP, and
Hosein Ala succeeded him as premier.
When the Majlis in mid-March unanimously accepted the principle o
nationalization, the British Foreign Office notified the Premier that an
act of nationalization would not legally terminate the oil company's
operations. Shortly thereafter, strikes broke out in the south as a result
of the company's cutting a hardship allowance for Iranian workers in certain
area5plus othercrievances. Martial law was declared on 26 March and in
early April rioting began in Abadan that did not end until troops fired
into the crowd; 6 were killed and 30 wounded, and two British oil workers
and a sailor were also killed.
As members of the National Front were presenting their draft of an
oil nationalization law to the special oil conmittee, Premier Ala resigned.
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APPENDIX A
ihe majlis approved the law and at thc same time voted to recommend, to
the Shah the appointment of Mosadeq as
Premier; the Senate followed suit.
rhe Shah acceded, appointing Mosadeq on 29 April; two days later he signed
the nine-point law that in broad terms ordered the government takeover from
the AIDC.. rhe company's response was to hold up the May monthly advance
payment 06,2 million and to ask that entire oil problem be submitted
to arbitration, a request that Iran did not acknowledge. On 25 ilay the
2ritish government brought the matter Before the International Court of
Justice, tha SQMC day it despatched the 16th Independent Parachute
gade Group to Cyprus; two Royal Navy cruisers and three frigates were
6011.)1,1
already in the Persian Gulf area. In addition to the government request,
A
the AIOC asked the ICJ to appoint an arbitrator, as provided in the 1933
concession agreement. The Iranian view of these appeals to The Hague was
simple: Iran did not recognize the competence of the court to deal with
the matter, which concerned Iran's internal affairs.
The United States became seriously involved in these discussions for
the first time in mid-May 1951. A State Department statement of 19 May urged
both sides to try to find an agreeable compromise solution; it noted that
the United States recognized the sovereign right of 'Iran to control its
resources and industries but said that the technical knowledge capital,
and trensport and marketing facilities were all controlled by the AIOC.
It further stated that U.S. oil companies had indicated that they would
not, in the face of unilateral Iranian action against the AIOC, be willing
. .
to undertake operations in Iran or provide technicians to work there.. The
note pleased neither Iran nor Britain; which Was the object of U.S. pressure
to accept the nationalization concept and work toward a compromise. At
president Truman's urging, conveyed through Ambassador Grady in Tehran and
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APPZNDIX A
by letters to Prime Minister Atlee and Premier Mosadeq, the British
agreed to send a delegation and the Iranians agreed to accept it.
-Talks 9ot underway on 14 June, with the Iranians demending that
the AIOC hand over 75% of net oil revenues since 20 March and put the
19Pen!
other 25;./, into a bank, presumably to be eventually paidgas compensation.
British, 9 :Bays later, proposed that a new company be established
The
by the AIOC to operate the oil industry on behalf of /ran; the profit
split would be 50-50. No compromise between these two points of view
appeared possible, and on 21 June the Briti&N want back to the ICJ with
a request for an injunction to halt the nationalization process until
the court had ruled on the original U.K. application. Since Iran had
already refused to recognize the court's jurisdiction, it was not repre-
sented when the court issued an order to maintain the status 'quo as of
1 May 1951, with a Board of Supervision consisting of two Iranians, two
Britons, and one individual of another nationality empowered to run the
industry.
\' Iran ignored this order and prepared to mcve the managers of the
National Iranian Oil
Company (MC) into Abadan, while the AIOC began to
slow down the output of the refinery and prepare For evacuation. Export
�
of nil stopped, and in the face of an antisabotage law introduced in the
Majlis,"the British staff resigned. Mosadeq wrote to President Truman on
27 June, complaining about the 3ritish attitude and the actions of the
British technicians, whom he wished to retain d's contract employees to
run the oil industry. Truman's reply on 9 July stressed the U.S. desire
for a peaceful settlement and urged Mosadeq to 90 along with the ICJ,
order; he also offered to send his foreign policy adviser, Averell
Harriman, to Iran to help work out a solution. Mosadeq ayreed to accept
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Harriman as a mediator, provided that any scheme he suggested would
be consistent with the nationalization law. Harriman's arrival in Tehran
on .15 July was hardly auspicious; in the course of a massive demonstration
against the United states, Tudeh mobs fought with the National Front and
other elements; the police and then the army intervened, and 15 people
were killed, over 200 wounded (the Minister of Interior, General Zahedi,
resigned -as a Tesult of the criticism he received over the handling of
the demonstration).
Seeking to rind some common ground for agreer3ent, Mari-111Jan persuaded
Mosadeq to enter into further discussions on how to implement the law,
contingent on the British'accepting the principle of nationalization. He
flew to London to arrange for a new British mission to Iran but found .the
Labor cabinet insistent on an improvement in conditions in the oil a-ea,
including "an end to provocation of British staff." Compromise versions
of the messages between the two governments were worked out by Harriman,
and Prime Minister Atlee and Foreign Secretary Morrison agreed to send
Richard Stokes, Lord Privy Seal, as the head of a high-level delegation .
to Tehran. Stokes' proposal, after preliminary meetings with the AIOC
staff in Abadan, was very similar to the earlier British suggestion that
an AIOC purchasing organization, with Iranian representation, handle the,
;
marketing oF the oil as a monopoly, with profits evenly divided. Iran,
of course, would not give up the idea of nationalization and said it
would discuss only three points--the purchase of oil for 3ritish needs,
AleC claims for compensation, and conditions required for continued em-
ployment of British technicians. At a private meeting of Harriman,
Mosadeq, and Stokes, the latter suggested that a British general manager
be appointed, to act under direction of the NIOC. The Iranians would not
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APPENDIX A.
accept this, proposing instead a board of management composed of experts
from countries "with no speCial political interest" in Iran.. Stokes
1151
would not even discuss this point and returned to London on 23 August.
U.S. Ambassador f;rady was replaced in Tehran on 11 September by Ambassador
Loy
Henderson, and Mosadeq was advised by Harriman from Washington that
his proposals were not workable since they did not conform to the practical
and commercial-aspects of the international oil industry. Iran told the
small British staff still in Abadan that it must leave the country within
a week from 27 September, and on 4 October the last of the mive personnel
duly left Iran.
In the meantime, the British government asked that the case be
considered by the U.N. Security Council as a potential threat to world
peace, and on 1 October the Council agreed to put the question of inter-
vention
on its agenda.
Mosadeq flew to New York to present Ircn s case.
The Security Council listened to both sides, debated the British resolution
from 15 to 19 October, and finally decided to adjourn the question until
after the ICJ had ruled on its own jurisdiction. In the British general
elections shor'tly thereafter, the Conservatives were returned to power,
with Winston Churchill as Prime Minister and Anthony Eden as Foreign
Secretary; in a speech in Commons, Eden declared there were three elements
that would be involved in a satisfactory solution to the problem�first,.
the Iranian economy depended on efficient operation of the oil industry;
second, the benefits must be shared between Iran and the developers of the
oil resources; and finally, fair colapansation must be paid for the act of
nationalization.
The ICJ met on 9 June 1952, and the legal arguments eventually were
reduced to the interpretation of the Iranian declaration of 2 October 1930
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tiPPENDIX A
reco.rizing the Jurisdiction of the Permanent Court of International
Justice (predecessor to the ICJ) in disputes "arisin3 after the ratification
of the present declaration with regard to situations or fact relating
directly or indirectly to the application of treaties or conventions
subsequent to the ratification of this declaration." The legal points
at issue were whether the dispute related to a treaty or convention and,
if so, was it a treaty or convention covered by the declaration? The
court finally ruled that the word "subsequent" referred to "treaties" and
not "situations" and that since the oil concession was not a treaty, it
did not have jurisdiction. The British thus lost their ICJ case and with
it their chance to have the Security Council pass on their resolution.
The matter nonetheless remained at an impasse. While the nations.
involved waited nearly 8 months for the ICJ ruling, other compromise
solutions were sought. In November 1951, officials of the International
Bank for Reconstruction and Development (Ino) proposed that the bank
finance, as trustee, the production and rerining of Iran's oil and then
sell it to the AICC at current Persian Gulf oil prices, Iran to receive .
payment at these prices, less an agreed discount which would go to the
AIOC. The British were willing to go along with this if AICC technicians
would be employed, but Iran would not agree to either the technicians or
the discount. The IMO tried again, proposing a neutral board of nana.ge-
alent responsible to the bank which would arrange a bulk export contract
for the sale of oil through established distribution channels; the profits
would be divided three ways--one share to Iran, one to the bulk purchaser,
and one to be held in reserve by the bank. gowever, on the question of
non-Iranian manacement, the use of Dritish technicians, und the selling
price of the oil, the negotiations ultidlately broke down. The IBRO
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mission returned to New York on 23 11,4-ch 1952. At about the same time,
President Truman notified Mosadeq that the United States would not give
Iran a loan of $120 million at a time when the country had an opportunity
to get "adequate revenue" from its oil resources; he thus none too subtly
pressed Mosadeq to settle the oil dispute.
Relations between the Iranian and British governments deteriorated
steadily. Iran atte.lpted to sell the oil stored in the tanks at Abadan
to Italian and Japanese firms, but AIOC action in the courts plus the
cooperation of the international oil industry with the British lifirited
the amounts of oil that could be delivered. In January 1952, Mosadeq
had ordered all British consulates closed; he followed that by closing all
foreign information �r1c1 cultural centers in Iran. lie made some attempt
to reach agreement with the British on compensation, but his proposals
included large offsetting amounts for unpaid royalties and other payments
stopped by the cessation of oil production in 1951. When the British in
October 1952 described his final proposals as "unreasonable and unacceptable,"
Mosadeq broke off diplomatic relations with the United Kingdom.
The premier in the meantime had scored internal political victories
of his own. Reelected by the new tajlis in July 1952, he asked for six
months of emergency powers to rule by decree in order to deal with the
critical economic situation. '-?hen the Shah refused, Mosadeq resigned,
and Oavam was appointed in his place; the result was four days of rioting
tile&
by both Tudah and the National Front. QavamA resiuned and on 23 July
Mosadeq again became _premier; his political ally and one of Tehran's best
known religious figures the mullah Ayatollah Xashani, A4 s named Speaker
of the Majlis, which then voted Msadeq decree powers for one year. The
Senate and the
Shah ccncurred, and the stage was set for the anti-Shah
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AN'ZNCV, A
political maneuvering of early 1953, during which ;lose-leg permitted the
Tudeh Party .:nd its front groups considerable freedom, perhaps with the
idea of pressuring the United States to come to Iran's aid. Implied
threats to turn to the Communists were contained in a :osadeq letter of
23 May 1953 to President Eisenhower requesting a large loan, and the
tisenhower reply, as a matter of policy, was cold in its rejection of
this threat and its accompanying bid for help. Eisenhower's letter
concluded:
I fully understand that the Government of Iran must determine
for itself which foreign e.nd domestic policies are likely to be most
advantageous to Iran and the Iranian people. In what I have written,
I am not trying toa.-dvise the Iranian Government on its best interests.
I am merely trying to explain why, in the circumstances, the Government
of the United States is not presently in a position to extend more aid
to Iran or to purchase Iranian oil.
In case Iran should so desire, the United States Government ,
hopes to be able to continue to extend technical assistance and military
aid on a basis caoparable to that given during the past year.
I note the concern reflected in your letter at the present dangerous
situation in Iran and sincerely hope that before it is too late the
Government of Iran will take such steps as are in its power to prevent
a further deterioration of that situation.
Following the August 1953 coup that overthrew losadeq, the oil
dispute was settled along the lines that had been proposed to Mosadeq--
the oil industry was nationalized, but its operations were directed by a
group of Foreign oil companies. The details of this arrangement were
worked out by a series of conferences, but Herbert Hoover Jr., as special
oil adviser to the Secretary of State, had an important role in convincing
the Iranians of the wisdom of dealing with a "consortium." Between Hoover's
initial visit to Tehran in October 1953 and the anneuncement of a new
agreement in 'dgust 1954 Britain and Iran resumed diplomatic.relations.
Undzr the terms of the agreement, the National Iranian Gil Company dele-
*.
gated basic operations in 100,000 square miles of southwestern Iran to an
intern.itional consortium known as Iranian Oil Participants, Ltd., until
ceeeisrans,
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Al'PENUIX A
1979, with an option of extension to 1994. British Petroleum, the.
new name of the AIOC, owned 40%, Royal Dutch-Shell 14%, Compagnie
Francaist des Petroles 6%, and U.S. oil companies 40% (7% each to Standard
Oil Company of New Jersey, Standard Oil Company of CM ifornia, Socony
lobil Oil Company, The Texas Company, and Gulf Oil Corporation, and 5%
to Iricon Agency, Ltd., comprised of nine small U.S. oil companies).
_
Since l95 the NIOC has carried out a number of operations of its own,
and, after the passage of .a new oil law in 1957, has allowed Italian,
U.S., and Canadian companies to explore for oil and conduct opetAtions
outside the consortium's territory. The consortium has produced 90% of
Iran's oil, however, and the rate of production has been the highest in the
world, increasing at an annual rate of almost 14% in the 1960's and
reaching 1.7 million barrels in 1971, which was 10% of world-output and
second largest production in the Middle East. Price increases levied by
Iran and other Persian Gulf members of the Organization of Petroleum
Exporting Companies in 1971 and 1972 resulted in an estimated 14 billion
For those years, and the Middle East oilcrisis of late 1973 raised prices
even higher. Iran is currently very concerned about its estimated reserves,
which at current rates of extraction may barely last until 1994. Oil �
accounts for 2373 of Iran's GNP, including some 39% of its foreiyn exchange
earnings and () 0% of its budyetary revenues.
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8ib1i2oraph1
APPENDIX A
Cottam, Rich:ird. Nationalism in Iran. University of Pittsburgh Press;
Pittsburgh, Pa.; 1964
Ford, Alan W. The Anglo-Iranian Oil Dispyte of 1951-1952. University
of California Press; Berkeley and Los Angeles; 1951
Heravi, Aehdi. Iranian-American Dtplomacy. Theo. Gus' Sons, Inc.;
Brooklyn, N.Y.; 1969
John. Arab Nationalism and British Imperialism. The Crcsset
Press; London; 1961
viarlowe, John. Iran --A Short Political
New Yurk; 1963.
\.Elwell-Sutton, Lawrence P. Persian Oil--A Study in Power Politics.
L=urence and shart Ltd.; London; 1955.
1/4-----Lenczowski, George. Oil and State in the Middle East. Cornell
University-Press; Ithaca9 N.Y.; 1960.
Guide. Frederick A. Praeger;
A-16
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Rnyeh
Baghdad
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Map, Appendi x A
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APOC concession, 1933 - 4 3" P.44.4.144
Consortium concession, 1954
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Rialc_aohic Sketches
:�1Te1f1,11A0 M'O,SADEQ:
APPENDIX D
. The bare bones of the life of the man who was Premier of Iran from
zve.�
23 April' 1951 to 19 August 1953 and who was the target of TPAJAX-4--e.
He was born about(b)(1)
(b)(3)
1311 (1B71 or 1379 are probably more accurate dates, but. 1911 was always
Tfl sr OW%
given as his official birth year because of the restrictions on the, age
of Majlis deputies) in Tehran, his motgeing a member of the ruling
Qajar dynasty .and his father the Minister of rinance for some 30 years.
His family background was thus the elite, wealthy, landowning class.
His secondary education 6:.4---4-4;nplete, Mosadcq was sent to Khorasan
as the Shah's financial agent while barely out of his middle teens.
In 1906, forced into exile because of his role in the Constitutional
Revolution that year, he went t:.+ Europe to study la ..4 at Paris,
an Neuchatel, earning his LL.D. from the last institution in 1914.
Returning to Iran, he was elected to the Majlis in 1915, serving on its
Financial comnittee. As Under Secretary of Finance in 1917, he resigned
after only a few months in office because he was prevented from carrying
out reforms in the notoriously padded payroll system. He became governor
of Fars Province in 1921, but his criticism of Reza Shah led to arrest
in 1930 and exile to the villages. He was again arrested in 1941 but was
released in the general political amnesty after Reza Shah's abdication.
Mosadcq was again elected to the Majlis in 1944, where in 1947 he organized
the National Front, a small, tightly knit, and highly influential group.
As a member of the oil commission, he gained in influence not only in the
Majlis but among the people, and his April 1951 appointment as Pre.nier
vas at the Majlis' request. Fron then until his removal from office in
August 1953, he concentrated his energies on expropriating the British-owned
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APPENDIX B
oil in-justry in defiance of Vestcrn attcpts to negotiate a settlement
that stopped short of complete nationalization. sentenced to three
years in prison in a post-coup trial, he was eventually pardoned by the
Shah in August 1956, but he was forced to remain in his village of
Ahmadabad under virtual house arrest for the 11 years until his death
in Harch 1967i Hc had suffered from cancer of the jaw and finally
succumbed to internal bleeding after two operations in Tehran.
often bizarre
The above facts do little to explain his/behavior as a
politician, but
nmost of his actions, even his most emotional and
apparently irrational ones, were probably well calculated. The popular
world ime.ge of him as an enfeebled old man, given to hysterical weeping
and fainting spells, served his own purposes and gave him tremendous
leverage among his people. He used the accepted belief that he. was
ill and weak to avoid things or people he did not want to face, and
his apparent physical debility added to the drama of his personality,
e.Vei�
which in public speeches was capable of moving his opponents.
Nos3daq's power rose from his consummate ability to appeal to
national aspirations and emotions. By attempting to deal with a heated
political problem in logical, rational terms based on economic facts,
the Critish w:.:re unable to achieve anything in the oil dispute but 46.
unify the people of Iran. Reza Shah had held power for 20 years by
appeal to latent Iranian nationalism; Mosadeq used this awakened nationalism
A
,ind the etsire for independence to keep himself in power and to defy
Britain. His speeches and programs appealed to social discontent,
xenordhobia, religious fanaticism, and national pride in past glories.
His enormous gamble on the oil issue, based on his belief that Critain
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APPENDIX B
dnd the United States would not let Iran go Communist, was part vanity,
part Islamic fatalism. He utilized foremost the technique of opposition--
his.ninc-man National Front opposed every government in power, whether
under Sated, Mansur, Razmara, or Ala�and then, once Premier, his single
plank was opposition to the British over the oil question.
Mosadeq was antagonistic to the Shah for many reasons: his mother
was a Qajar, whose family was overthrown by the Shah's father, the same
man that had exiled and then imprisoned him; in addition, he had long
believed in constitutional reform to reduce the power of the monarchy.
He opposed the army because it had brought Reza .Shah to power and was
the main source of support for Mohammad Reza Shah; by retiring senior
officers and putting in his own Chief-of Staff, the young, French-trained
Taqi Riahi, he had obtained a degree of cont*er the army.
But, by so doing, he s:t the stage for the officer corps to turn a(ainst
him. His own extrcme nationalism, fantasies of omnipotence, and lack
of cnnsciace�in manipulating Tuck+, at the risk of it getting out Of
control as it did in the streets of Tehran on 13 August, were the
seeds of his own eventual downfall. But he was a most unusual man,
one whose character caught the world's fancy, even as he drove his country-
men toward disaster. At any time in 1951 or 1902 he could have had the
same compromise through which his successors gained a nationalized oil
industry efficiently run by foreign experts to give Iran the revenue
that financed the Shah's White Revolution. He chose to gamble on total
victory over In-itain, the United States, and the international oil
industry�and he lost.
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MAJ. GEN, FAZLOILAH ZAHEDI
Born in 1897 in
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APPENDIX B
Hamadan, Zahedi graduated from the Military School
in Tehran and served during the years of World War I and the postwar
period under Reza Khan, then a colonel in the Cossack Br:igade. As a
combat officer, he was decorated for action against assorted bandits
and insurgents, including rebellious Kurds, Lurs, and Turkomans. He
had become a division commander by 1942, after service as head of the
Gendarmerie and the Tehran Police, but he was arrested by the British
that year for pro-German activity (his name was found in the papers of
Franz Mayer, a principal Nazi agent in Tehran, as an officer who would
protect German agents) and deported to Palestine, where he was held
until 1945. Despite his arrest and subsequent three years in a detention
camp, he did not become fanatically anti-British as did many xenophobic
Iranians. Returning to Tehran after the war in 1945, h? was given
command of the Fars Division and promoted to major general. In 1948,
as Inspector General of the army, he was severely injured in a tank
accident, losing four ribs, and after 7 months,of medical treatment in
Germany, some of it by U.S. Army doctors, he was retired in May 1949.
The Shah made him his honorary adjutant, and in November 1949 appointed
him Director General of the Tehran Police. In April 1951 Zahedi became
Minister of Interior in the Ala cabinet and was retained in that post
by Mosadeq when he became Premier. He resigned in August 1951, following
There was a Goack Brigade in the Persian Army solely because Nasr-
ed-Din Shah visited Russia in 1878 and was provided with a Cossack
escort by the Czar. The Shah was so impressed by the Cossacks that he
asked the Czar to send him Kussian officers to organize such a unit in
his own army. The Brigade retained Russian senior officers and noncoms
until 1920, and as long as it was in existence, it was the best trained
and most professional unit in the army
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the anti-U.S. riots in Tehran on 15 July in which the mob got out of
hand and the army had to be called in to fire on them, with the result
that many died and hundreds were wounded, on both sides. He was a prime
suspect of the Mosadeq government as a potential coup leader and was
briefly arrested in February 1953.
ARDESHIR ZAHEDI
Born in December 1927, General Zahedi's son, Ardeshir, was educated
At the Ameriren University in Bei)tvt and at Utah. State university where
he earned a BS degree in 1950. Because of his training and language
ability, he served with the Rural Improvement Commission which was
administering U.S. technical assistance until he was forced to resign
in 1952 by Mosadeq. During the.planning and operational phases of
the coup, he acted as the communications channel to his father and
performed very well under difficult circumstances. He was married
for a time to the Shah's daughter by Queen Fawzia and has never
remartied since his divorce. He has rstained the Shah's-faor and, -
in fact, introduced the Shah to Farah in Hay 1959, the girl who later
became Queen and mother of the Shah's sons. Ardeshir was the Iranian
Ambassador to the United States in 1960-62 and returned again in April
1973 to the pest . In the interim, he was Ambassador to the United
Kingdom, 1962-67, and Minister of Foreign Affairs, 1967-71.
MAJ. GEN. NADR BATMANGELICH
General Batmangelich (also spelled Batmanqiliche Batmangelij) was
born in Tehran about 1905 and educated in Germany, the Iranian Military
School,
and the German Staff College. He fought in the Luristan and
Fars tribal campaigns and was interned by the Allies from August 1943
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APPENDIX B
to June 1945. He visited the United States on a purchasing mission in
1950 and was put on the retired list in 1952 by Mosadeq. Named Chief
of Staff of the army immediately after the 1953 coup, he retained
that post despite friction with Premier Zahedi until December 1955
when he was made Ambassador to Pakistan to ease him out of the army
command. Clashes with General Hedayet, Chief of the new Supreme Staff,
were the probably cause of his reassignment. He then became AMbassador
to Iraq in January 1957, was Minister of /nterior in 1958-59,
Adjutant to the Shah in 1959.
and became
(b)(1)
(b)(3)
After serving as Governor
of Khorasan, 1965-68, he retired to private life. He had ser\ed as
Permanent Iranian Delegate to the CENT� Military Committee before
retiring from the army 1965.
Batmangelich nes,er lied down his behavior on the night of 15
August, details of which were known only to few insiders in the Zahedi
coup group. He failed to take his objectie, the Staff Headquarters,
and breaking down, he either turned himself in or was arrested by troops
loyal to Mosadeq. There was reason to beliele he talked 6ree1y to
interroriators, providing them with a list of other officers inAol%ed in
the coup.
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APPMIX B
MOHAMMAD REZA SHAH PAHLAVI
When Mohammad Reza became Shah in 1941 at the age of 22 following
his fathers abdication, Iran was occupied by foreign troops--Soviet
British, and American--and its army was demoralized. He had no solid
power base and no political machine, and as a result he spent the first
10 years of his reign in conflict with the traditional political power
structure bent on regaining the influence it had lost to Reza Shah. The
military coup that ousted Mosadeg in August 1953 was thus a major mile-
ston- in the sh-h' -olitic-1 life.
Mohawmad Reza was born on 26 October 1919; he studied 6 years as a
cadet at the Military School of Tehran and then went to Switzerland in
1931 for his secondary education. Returning in 1936, he attended the -
Iranian Military College, from which he graduated 2 years later as a
second lieutenant. His first marriage, in 1939, was to Princess Fawzia
of Egypt, sister of King Farug, and a daughter, Shanaz,was the only child
of this marriage. Divorcing Fawzia, he married Sorya Esfandiari, a half-
German, half-Bakhtiari beauty to whom he was very devoted, but the marriage
was childless and the throne needed an heir. After the inevitable divorce,
he married Farah Diba in 1959, and Crown Prince Reza was born in 1960,
followed by two daughters and Prince Ali Reza, securing the succession
of the Pahlavi line.
Although various sources \criticized the young Shah as suspicious
and indecisive to the point of permanent instability, others saw his
strengths. An OSS report in 1943 said:
Mohammad Shah is a man of much stronger purpose than is
generally realized. He stands almost alone, distrusts most
advisers, is honest in his efforts to sedure a democratic form
of government for Iran. He is not easily influenced and cannot
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be shaken. Installed as a figurehead during the 1941 crisis,
he may yet surprise the factions in his country and the outside
powers. He thinks along Western lines, and he is inalienably
attached to his Iranian army. The military budget is half the
national expenditure just now. Yet, of course, the army is
almost his only backing within Iran.
In 1951, also on the positive side, the U.S. Embassy in Tehran
noted:
It is important to observe that the Shah, in ten years of
political wavering, has Ater turned against the intellectual
interests, sports, and hobbies which he learned from European
sources. His mind remains alert and his principles, although
often betr9yed, retain great similarity to Christian ethics
and philosoptly. The tragedy in the conflict of this healthy
i ntellect against the vicious Persian scene carries some
triumph since the Shah, so far, has not become corrupted.
rhe Shah took the successful coup of 1953 as a popular mandate to
seize control of his country from the political factions and the ambitious
generals; he has never since allowed them to threaten his position or
his program. His hasty flight to Baghdad and Rome was either forgiven
or forgotten in the triumph of the moment, and although General Zahedi
was often angered by the Shah's vacillation and lack of decisiveness,
those very characteristics enabled him to frustrate the volatile Zahedi
and eventually bring about his resignation and voluntary exile. Given .
confidence by the popular support he saw during the coup, he pressed
ahead to consolidate his power, carefully controlling political activity,
which he has said can be permitted to function'fi-eely only after economic
and social development have taught the people to act responsibly. His
reforms launched in 1962 as the "White Revolution" have accomplished much;
without the power and prestige of. the throne coupled with the Shah's
authoritarianism and determination, the reforms and development probably
could not have taken place.
The rapid escalation of oil prices in 1973-74 has enhanced the Shah's
prestige as spokesman for the more extreme oil-producing countries, and he
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APPENDIX 8
has been quick to resent criticism of the view that oil is the main
resource of those countries, a resource that cannot be replaced and
that, must be conserved, if only by the pressure of cost. The situation
has clearly made the Shah a man whom the world listens to, and he
has made the most of it.
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APPENDIX C
THE LEGEND: HOW THE PRESS VIEWED TPAJAX
The world of journalism--ever on the alert for the
mote in somebody else's eye--found long ago that the Central-
Intelligence Agency made great copy. Proceeding on the
theory that their readers will believe anything dealing
with "spies," "agents," and "the secret world of espionage,"
a number of writers have told what they insist is the
inside story of the CIA involvement in Iran in 1953. A
sampling of these is included here, without extensive
comment, since the distortions and guesses will be obvious
Lo those who have read this history.
Andrew Tully, for example, in CIA--The Inside Story
devotes Chapter 7, "King-Making in Iran" to a version of
TPAJAX most notable for the purple of its flamboyant prose.
Some significant passages are:
It was in 1953, of course,that the CIA
stage-managed the overthrow of Premier
Mohammed Mossadegh, that celebrated com-
pulsive weeper, who had seized Britain's
monopolistic oil company and was threaten-
ing to do business with the Kremlin. At
the time CIA's coup was hailed as a blow
for democracy, which it was. But after
'disposing of Mossadegh, CIA and the State
Department reverted once again to a weak-
ness that so often has been disastrous.
In the setting up of the new regime, in
which CIA took a major part, no consideration
wr)s, given as to whether the new men had any
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intention of attempting to relieve the
misery of the Iranian people.. It was
enough for the United States that they
were anti-Communist.
When Mossadegh announced the expropria-
tion of Anglo-Iranian Oil and nationalization
of Iran's oil fields, the international
uproar was thunderous. Mossadegh could not
do that, and the Western bankers would
prove it to him. Iranian oil was virtually
boycotted. Mossadegh promptly tried to
awing some deals with smaller, independent
companies to work the Iranian fields, but
the State Department gave these companies
little encouragement - which is to gay it
told them "hands off." Meanwhile, Iran
was losing its oil revenues and going broke.
Even American financial aid was not enough
although the State Department, with under-
standable reluctance, donated $1,600,000
for a technical rural improvement program
in 1951 and followed that with a foreign
aid grant of $23,000,000 in 1952. Most
of the latter was used to make up Iran's
foreign exchange shortages, but Iran remained
financially unstable.
Meanwhile, CIA learned that Mossadegh
was carrying on a clandestine flirtation
with Iran's furtive Communist party, the
Tudeh. Soviet intelligence agents flocked
into the ancient capital of Teheran and
the traffic jam between them and Allen
Dulles' energetic young men was almost
ludicrous. Almost daily, emissaries from
the Soviet danced attendance on Mossadegh as
.he lolled recumbent on his couch, alternately
dozing and weeping. Inevitably, the old
dictator put it squarely up to President
Eisenhower. In a letter received by the
President on May 28, 1953, Mossadegh over-
played his hand - he attempted to blackmail
the United States by warning that unless
Iran got more American financial aid he
would be forced to seek help elsewhere.
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Elsewhere was the Soviet Union, with which
Mossadegh suggested he would conclude both
an economic agreement and a mutual defense
pact.
Since Iran otherwise was broke, that
meant Mossadegh would have to pledge the
rich Iranian oil fields and the refinery at
Abadan, the world's largest, in return for
financial assistance from the Soviet. The
danger to the West was clear. With Iran's
oil assets in its pockets, the Russians
would have little trouble eventually
achieving a prime object of Russian foreign
policy since the days of the Czars - access
to a warm water outlet on the Persian Gulf,
the free world's life line to the Far East.
But even if Russia were to get just Iran's
oil, the Western world would be weakened
throughout the Middle East and Soviet prestige
would soar. It was clear, too, of course,
that Anglo-Iranian Oil had a stake of billions
of dollars, and when private enterprise, of
that magnitude is involved State Departments
and Foreign Offices are apt to react most
sensitively.
The time had come for the United States
to embark on an international gamble. CIA
reports were that Mossadegh, although popular.
with the masses, had never been able to under-
mine the young Shah with his people. If
something were to happen whereby the Shah
was able to take over more firmly the reins
of government, there was a good chance
Mossadegh could be unseated. In any event,
the Shah had a better than even chance of
winning any popularity contest with Mossadegh.
So for a month the White House stalled
Mossadegh, avoiding a direct reply in a welter
of polite diplomatic notes seeking further
discussions. Then President Eisenhower favored
Mossadegh with a blunt reply: "No." Everybody
agreed it was a calculated risk, a gamble
that Mossadegh could be dealt with in such
a fashion that he would be powerless to carry
out his threat. The CIA forthwith set the
wheels in motion for dealing with this tough
old man.
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First, on August 10, Allen Dulles flew
to Europe to join his wife for a "holiday"
in the Swiss Alps. Although the political
situation in Teheran was becoming more
ominous - Mossadegh was conferring daily
with a Russian economic mission - United
States Ambassador Loy Henderson decided he
would like a vacation to Switzerland, too.
Almost simultaneously, the Shah's sister,
the pretty and tough-minded Princess Ashraf,
marched into the royal palace and gave her
brother the rough side of her tongue for his
hesitancy in facing up to Mossadegh. Then
she, too, flew off to Switzerland.
Certainly, the Russian espionage network
must have surmised that something was
cooking as. Dulles, Henderson and Princess
Ashraf turned up at the same Swiss resort.
Their suspiaions were strengthened when an
old Middle Eastern hand named Brigadier
General H. Norman Schwartzkopf suddenly
was discovered in the midst of a leisurely
flying vacation across the Middle East.
He had been to Pakistan, Syria and Lebanon
and, while the Russians fumed, he ultimately
turned up in Iran,
The Reds had a right to be fearful, for
Schwartzkopf had long been an anathema to
the Kremlin. Americans remember him most
vividly as the man who ran the Lindbergh
kidnapping investigation in 1932, when he
was head of the New Jersey State Police.
But the world of international politics
knew him better as the man who, from 1942
to 194,8, had been in charge of reorganizing
the Shah's national police force. In this
job, Schwartzkopf spent little time tracking
down ordinary criminals; he was kept busy
protecting the government against its
enemies, a job that required the setting
up of an intelligence system to keep watch
on various political cliques which might
seek the Shah's overthrow.
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In the course of these intriguing duties,
Schwartzkopf had become a close friend and
adviser to the Shah and, more important, to
Major General Fazlollah Zahedi, one of his
colleagues on the police force. So when
Schwartzkopf turned up in Teheran in August
he could explain with a straight face that
he had come merely "to see old friends again.
The Russians stormed' and protested over his
presence in Iran but Schwartzkopf went his
casual way, dropping in to see the Shah one
afternoon, spending the morning with General
Zahedi, and renewing contacts with other old
pals in the police and army.
And suddenly the Shah seemed to have
located his courage and authority. On
Thursday, August 13, the Shah handed down a
ukase that sounded as if it had been written
in collaboration by Schwartzkopf and Zahedi.
Mossadegh was ousted as Premier and his
successor was to be General Zahedi. The
Shah ordered the colonel of the Imperial
Guards to serve the notice on Mossadegh, and
the wheels seemed to be turning.
But for some reason the colonel seemed
seized by inaction. It was not until two
days later, on midnight of August 15, that
the colonel and a platoon of his troops
showed up at Mossadegh's residence. There
they found themselves surrounded by an array
of tanks and jeeps, manned by hard-faced
Army veterans Mossadegh had rounded up while
the colonel vacillated.
The colonel, of course, was clapped into
jail and Mossadegh announced that a revolt
against the rightful government of Iran had
been crushed. He also had some unkind things
to say about the youthful Shah, and Iran's
king of kings and his queen took the hint
and hopped a plane for Rome by way of the
then royally safe country of Iraq.
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Schwartzkopf, however, held his own ground
on the Iranian stage. He took over as unofficial
paymaster for the Mossadegh-Must-Go clique.
Certain Iranians started to get rich, and the
word later was that in a period of a few days
Schwartzkopf supervised the careful spending
of more than ten million of CIA's dollars.
Mossadegh suddenly lost a.great many supporters.
The climax came on Wednesday, August 19,
four days after Mossadegh had "crushed the revolt.
The tense capital was filled with troops, mounted
against a new uprising, but none of them looked
very happy. There seemed no reason for alarm
when a long and winding procession of performers
appeared on the scene for one of these impromtu
parades common in Teheran. In the procession
were tumblers, weight-lifters, wrestlers, boxers
-- all performing their specialties as they moved
slowly along the streets. As usual, crowds
flocked out into the streets to watch the show
and to follow the parade.
Then, apparently, somebody gave a signal.
The weird procession suddenly broke into an
organized shouting mob. "Long Live the Shah!"
they cried. "Death to Mossadegh." The crowd
joined in the shouting, some of them undoubtedly
keeping one hand tight against pockets where
their American wages were secured. Soon the
entire capital was in an\iaproar, and when the
din was at its loudest troops who had remained
loyal to the Shah launched their attack.
For more than nine hours the battle raged,
with Mossadegh's troops fighting fiercely but
gradually giving ground. Obviously, they were
confused by the tactics and swift logistical
maneuvers of the Shah's forces, -who had been
exposed to some American who knew the ropes.
Anyway, by midnight Mossadegh's soldiers had
been driven into a little ring around the
Premier's palace and they were forced to
surrender.. Troops forcing their way into the
palace captured Mossadegh as he lay weeping
in his bed, clad in silk striped pajamas.
Somebody telephoned Rome and the Shah and
his queen packed again, to return to Teheran
and install Zahedi as Premier.
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This was a coup necessary to the security
of the United States, and probably to that
of the Western World. But it was another
case of the United States not requiring tough
enough terms in return for its support. It
is senseless, as some observers have written,
to say that the Iranians overthrew Mossadegh
all by themselves. It was an American opera-
tion from beginning to end. But at the end,
CIA and the American government -- stood
by while a succession of pro-Western and anti-
Communist administrations, uninterested in
the smallest social reforms, brought Iran
once again to the edge of bankruptcy. And,
of course, the American taxpayer has contributed
hundreds of millions of dollars to this
corruption.
Then, David Wise and Thomas B. Ross in their "explosive
bestseller" The Invisible Government provided yet another
version, as follows:
1953: Iran
But guerrilla raids are small actions com-
pared to an operation that changes a government.
There is no doubt at all that the CIA organized
and directed the 1953 coup that overthrew
Premier Mohammed Mossadegh and kept Shah
Mohammed Reza Pahlevi on his throne. But few
Americans know that the coup that toppled the
government of Iran was led by a CIA agent who
was the grandson of President Theodore Roosevelt.
Kermit "Kim" Roosevelt, also a seventh
cousin of President Franklin D. Roosevelt, is
still known as "Mr. Iran" around the CIA for
his spectacular operation in Teheran more than
a decade ago. He later left the CIA and joined
the Gulf Oil Corporation as "government relations"
director in its Washington office. Gulf named
his a vice-president in 1960.
One legend that grew up inside the CIA had
it that Roosevelt, in the grand Rough Rider
tradition, led the revolt against the weeping
Mossadegh with a gun at the head of an Iranian
tank commander as the column rolled into Teheran.
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A CIA man familiar with the Iran story
characterized this as "a bit romantic" but said:
"Kim did run the operation from a basement in
Teheran -- not from our embassy." He added
admiringly: "It was a real James Bond operation."
General Fazollah Zahedi,* the 'man the CIA
chose to replace Mossadegh, was also a character
worthy of spy fiction. A six-foot-two, handsome
ladies' man, he fought the Bolsheviks, was
captured by the Kurds, and, in 1942, was kidnapped
by the British, who suspected him of Nazi intrigues.
During World War II the British and the Russians
jointly occupied Iran. British agents, after
snatching Zahedi, claimed they found the following
items in his bedroom: a collection of German
automatic weapons, silk underwear, some opium,
letters from German parachutists operating in the
hills, and an illustrated register of Teheran's .
most exquisite prostitutes.
After the war Zahedi rapidly moved back into
public life. He was Minister of Interior when
Mossadegh became Premier in 1951. Mossadegh
nationalized the British-owned Anglo-Iranian Oil
Company in April and seized the huge Abadan
refinery on the Persian Gulf.
The refinery was shut down; thousands of
workers were idled and Iran faced a financial
crisis. The British, with the backing of Western
governments, boycotted Iran's oil and the local
workers were unable to run the refineries at
capacity without British techniques.
Mossadegh connived with the Tudeh, Iran's
Communist party, and London and Washington feared
that the Russians would end up with Iran's vast
oil reserves flowing into the Soviet Union,
which shares a common border with Iran.
Mossadegh, running the'crisis from his bed --
he claimed he was a very sick man -- had
broken with Zahedi, who balked at tolerating
the Tudeh party.
* He died September 1, 1963, at age sixty-seven.
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It was against this background that the CIA
and Kim Roosevelt moved in to oust Mossadegh and
install Zahedi. At the time of the coup Roosevelt,
then thirty-seven, was already a veteran intelli-
gence man. He was born in Buenos Aires. His
father, the President's second son, was also named
Kermit. Kim was graduated from Harvard just
before World War II, and he taught history there
and later at the California Institute of Technology.
He had Married while still at Harvard. He left
the academic life to serve in the OSS, then joined
the CIA after the war as a Middle East specialist.
His father had died in Alaska during the war;- his
uncle, Brigadier General Theodore Roosevelt, died
on the beaches of Normandy a Year later,
The British and American governments had
together decided to mount an operation to over-
throw Mossadegh. The CIA's estimate was that it
would succeed because the conditions were right;
in a showdown the people of Iran would be loyal
to the Shah. The task of running the operation
went to Kim Roosevelt, then the CIA's top operator
in the Middle East.
Roosevelt entered Iran legally. He drove
across the border, reached Teheran, and then
dropped out of sight. He had to, since he had
been in Iran before and his face was known.
Shifting his headquarters several times to
keep one step ahead of Mossadegh's agents,
Roosevelt operated outside of the protection
of the American Embassy. He did have the help
of about five Americans, including some of the
CIA men stationed in the embassy.
In addition, there were seven local agents,
including two top Iranian intelligence operatives.
These two men communicated with Roosevelt
through cutouts -- intermediaries -- and he
never saw them during the entire operation.
As the plan for revolt was hatched, Brigadier
General H. Norman Schwarzkopf, who used to
appear on radio's "Bang Busters, n turned up
in Teheran. He had reorganized the Shah's
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police force there in the 1940s. He was best
known for his investigation of the Lindbergh
baby kidnaping case when he headed the New
Jersey State Police in 1932. Schwarzkopf,
an old friend of Zahedi's, claimed he was in
town "just to see old friends again." But
he was part of the operation.
On August 13 the Shah signed a decree
dismissing Mossadegh and naming Zahedi as
Premier. The uncooperative Mossadegh arrested
the unfortunate colonel who brought in his
notice of dismissal. Mobs rioted in the
streets; the thirty-three-year-old Shah and
his queen (at that time the beautiful Soraya)
fled to Baghdad by plane from their palace on
the Caspian Sea.
For two chaotic days, Roosevelt lost com-
munication with his two chief Iranian agents.
Meanwhile; the Shah had made his way to Rome;
Allen Dulles flew there to confer with him.
Princess Ashraf, the Shah's attractive twin
sister, tried to play a part in the inter-
national intrigue, but the Shah refused to
talk to her.
In Teheran, Communist mobs controlled the
streets; they destroyed statues of the Shah
to celebrate his departure. Suddenly, the
opposition to Mossadegh consolidated. The
Army began rounding up demonstrators. Early
on August 19 Roosevelt, from his hiding place,
gave orders to his Iranian agents to get
everyone they could find into the streets.
The agents went into the athletic clubs
in Teheran and rounded up a strange assortment
of weight-lifters, muscle-men and aymnasts.
The odd procession made its way through the
bazaars shouting pro-Shah slogans. The crowd
grew rapidly in size; By mid-morning it was
clear the tide had turned against Mossadegh
and nothing could stop it.
Zahedi came out of hiding and took over.
The Shah returned from exile. Mossadegh
went to jail and the leaders of the Tudeh
were executed.
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In the aftermath, the British lost their
monopoly on Iran's oil. In August, 1958, an
international consortium of Western oil companies
signed a twenty-five-year pact with Iran for
its oil. Under it, the former Anglo-Iranian
Oil Company got 40 percent, a group of American
companies* got 40 percent, Royal Dutch Shell
got 14 percent and the Compagnie Francaise
des Petroles 6 percent. Iran got half of the
muItimillion-dollar income from the oil fields
under the deal, the Anglo-Iranian was assured
a compensation payment of $70,000,000.
The United States, of course, has never
officially admitted the CIA's role. The
closest Dulles came to doing so was in a CBS
television show in 1962, after his retirement
from the CIA.10 He was asked whether it was true
that "the CIA people spent literally millions
of dollars hiring people to riot in the streets
and do Other things, to get rid of Mossadegh.
Is there anything you can say about that?"
"Well," �Dulles replied, "I can say that the
statement that we spent many dollars doing
that is utterly false."
The former CIA chief also hinted at the
CIA's Iran role in his book The Craft of
Intelligence. "... support from the outside
was given ... to the Shah's supporters,"
he wrote, without directly saying-it came
from the CIA.
Magazines did their part as well. In The Saturday
Evening Post for 6 November 1954, Richard and Gladys
Harkness co-authored an article entitled "The Mysterious
Doings of CIA," which appears to have been a key source
Ear both Tully and Wise-Ross. Richard and Gladys said:
* Gulf Oil, Standard Oil of New Jersey and California,
The Texas Company and Socony-Mobile.
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Another CIA-influenced triumph was the successful
overthrow of Iran in the summer of 1953, of old,
dictatorial Premier Mohammad Mossadegh and the
return to power of this country's friend Shah
Mohammad Riza Pahlevi.
On May 28, 1953, President Eisenhower re-
ceived a letter from Mossadegh amounting to a
bare faced attempt at international blackmail.
The -White House stalled Mossadegh for one
month; then turned down the crafty premier with
a blunt no. This was a calculated risk at best.
It was a daring gamble, in fact, that Mossadegh
would not. remain in power to carry out his threat.
It was, as well, a situation which required a
little doing. The doing began in short order
through a chain of stranger-than-fiction circum-
stances involving [Allen] Dulles, a diplomat,
a princess and a policeman.
�
On August tenth Dulles packed his bags and
flew to Europe to join his wife for a vacation
in the Swiss Alps. The political situation in
Teheran was becoming more cOnspiratorial by the
hour. Mossadegh was consorting with a Russian
diplomatic-economic mission. Loy Henderson,
United States Ambassador to Iran, felt he could
leave his post for a short "holiday" in Switzer-
land. Princess Ashraf, the attraCtive and strong-
willed brunette twin sister of the Shah, chose
the same week to fly to a Swiss alpine resort.
It was reported that she had had a stormy session
with her brother in his pink marble palace,
because of his vacillating in facing up to
Mossadegh.
The 'fourth of the assorted characters in this
drama, Brig. Gen. H. Norman Schwartzkopf, at
this time took a flying vacation across the
Middle East. His itinerary included apparently
aimless and leisurely stops in Pakistan, Syria,
Lebanon -- and Iran. Schwartzkopf is best
known to the public as the man who conducted
the Lindberg kidnapping investigation in 1932,
when he was head of the New Jersey state police.
But from 1942 through 1948 he was detailed to
Iran to reorganize the Shah's national police
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force. Schwartzkopf's job in Iran was more
than the tracking down of routine criminals.
He protected the government against its enemies
-- an asignment requiring intelligence on the
political cliques plotting against the Shah,
knowledge of which army elements could be
counted on to remain loyal and familiarity with
Middle East psychology. Schwartzkopf became
friend and advisor to such individuals as
Maj. Gen. Fazlollah Zahedi, his colleague on
the. police force, and the Shah himself.
Schwartzkopf returned to Iran in August of
1953, he said, "just to see old friends again."
Certainly the general will deny any connection
with the events that followed his renewal of
acquaintanceships with the Shah and Zahedi.
But as Mossadegh and the Russian propaganda
press railed nervously at Schwartzkopf's
presence in Iran, developments started to unfold
in one-two-three order.
On Thursday, August thirteenth, the Shah ,
suddenly isued a double-edged ukase: Mossadegh
was ousted by royal decree and his successor
as premier was to be General Zahedi. The Shah
ordered the colonel of the Imperial Guards to
serve the notice on Mossadegh. Two days later,
at midnight of Saturday, August fifteenth, the
colonel went to.Mossadegh's residence to find
himself and his platoon surrounded by tanks and
jeeps. The colonel Ne)as clapped-in jail, and
Mossadegh proclaimed that the revolt had been
crushed. The Shah and his queen, taking events
at face value fled to Rome by way of Iraq.
On Wednesday, August nineteenth, with the army
standing close guard around the uneasy capital,
a grotesque procession made its way along the
street leading to the heart of Teheran. There
were tumblers turning handsprings, weight lifters
twirling iron bars and wrestlers flexing their
biceps. As spectators grew in number, the bizarre
assortment of performers began shouting pro-Shah
slogans in unison. The crowd took up the chant
and then, after one precarious moment, the
balance of public psychology swung against Mossadegh.
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Upon signal, it seemed, army forces on the
Shah's side began an attack. The fighting lasted
a bitter nine hours. By nightfall, following
American-style military strategy and logistics,
loyalist troops drove Mossadegh's elements into
a tight cordon around the premier's palace. They
surrendered, and Mossadegh was captured as he
lay weeping in his bed, clad in striped silk
pajamas. In Rome a bewildered young Shah prepared
to fly home and install Zahedi as premier and to
give Iran a pro-Western regime.
Thus it was that the strategic little nation
of Iran was rescued from the closing clutch of
Moscow. Equally important, the physical over-
throw of Mossadegh was accomplished by the Iranians
themselves. It is the guiding premise of CIA's
third force that one must develop and nurture
indigenous freedom legions among captive-or
threatened people who stand ready to take personal
risks for their own- liberty.45
More than a year later, Crosby Noyes, writing in the
Washington Star for 27 September 1953, discussed obliquely
the significance of Ambassador Henderson, CIA Director Dulles,
and Princess Ashraf being in Zurich the same week in August,
and mentioned General Schwarzkopf's visit in detail. Without
making any direct accusations, he hinted: "It is possible
that the CIA agents whose departure from Iran was observed
and reported were on purely routine intelligence missions.
It is possible -- as a leading columnist has suggested --
that Mr. Henderson's trip to Switzerland was no more than
a 'policy of studied indifference' on the part of the State
45 Richard and Gladys Harkness, "The Mysterious Doings of
CIA." The Saturday Evening Post, November 6, 1954, pp. 66-68.
Reprinted by special peimission of The Saturday Evening Post.
�1954 The Curtis Publishing Company.
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Department toward the Mossadegh regime. A friend of the
Princess Ashraf here in Washington holds stoutly to the
view that her visit with the Shah was undertaken simply to
ask him for money. It is possible that Allen Dulles is
genuinely fond of mountain-climbing and that Gen. Schwarzkopf
just happened to show up in Teheran at a critical moment.
It is all perfectly possible. But as long _
JA the
practice of putting two and two together continues, the
argument about what really happened in Iran last summer
seems likely to continue."
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a. Presentation to the Shah
(2)
Major issue is to maintain indepen-
dence Iran and keep from the Soviet
orbit. To do this Mossadeq must be
removed.
(3) Present dynasty best bulwark uational
sovereignty.
(4) While Mossadeq in power no aid for
Iran from United States.
(5) Mossadeq must go.
(6) US-UK financial aid will be forth-
coming to successor government.
(7) Acceptable oil settlement will be
offered but successor government
will not be rushed into it.
� (b)(1)
(b)(3)
b. Demands on the Shah
(1) You must take leadership in over-
throw Mossadeq.
(2) If not, you bear responsibility for
collapse of country.
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(b)(3)
II. Arrangement with Zahedi
A. After agreement with Shah per above, inform
Zahedi he chosen to head successor Overnment.
with US-UK support.
B. Agree on specific plan for action and timetable
for action. There are two ways to put Zahedi in
office.
Quasi-legally, whereby the Shah names Zahedi
Prime Minister by royal firman.
2. Military coup.
;
Quasi-legal method to be tried first. If success-
ful at least part of machinery for military coup
will be brought into action. If it fails, mili-
tary .coup will follow in matter of hours.
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(b
(b
B. Would be widely publicized that this refuge move-
ment on basis two grounds popular dissatisfac-
tion with Mossadeq government as follows:
1. Ground one that Mossadeq government basically
anti-religious as most clearly demonstrated
ties between Mossadeq and Tudeh; and Mossadeq
and USSR.
(1)
(3)
(b)(1)
(b)(3)
2. Ground two that Mossadeq is leading the
country into complete economic collapse
through his unsympathetic dictatorship.
(b)(1)
(b)(3)
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C. Religious refuge to take place at the dawn of
the coup day. Immediately followed by effort
have Majlis'pass a motion to censure the
government. This is. to be followed by the dis-
missal of Mossadeq and the appointment of Zahedi
as successor. If successful, the coup would be
completed by early afternoon. Failing success,
the coup would be mounted later that evening.
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APPL;allY, F
rho following is a U.S. Embassy translation of the Court of Revision
verdict aoinst Mosadeq and Riahi, handed down on 12 Aey 1954. It.
reviews the case, sums up the charges against the two defendonts, and
examines their respective defense. It objects to and overrules the
verict of tha Ailitary Court of First Instance and concludes by
resentencing the defendants.
Under the indictment issued by the Army Prosecutor, the aceused
were charged with the following:
In connection with Or. Mohammad Aosadeq--
1. Order for the arrest of Col. Nematollah "asiri (now brigadier
general), Commander of the Royal Guards, who carried the order
for the dismissal of Mosat:eq;
2. Unlawful ef ,,Ff:cial and nonofficial persons;
3. Disarming of the Royal Guerds protecting HIM the Shah and
the royal palaces;
4. Sealing of the royal palaces, dispossessing the offiCials
and guard of the Royal Court from the properties and palaces
of the Shah;
5. Issue of telegrams to the Iranian 'imbessat!,ors abroad
instructing them not to contact HIM the Shah;
6. Issue of instructions for omission of the Shah's-name from
the morning and evening prayers in the military centers;
7. Issue of instructions for the holding of meetings by taking
advantage of Government propaganda facilitie with a view to
insulting the monarch and the constitutional regime, and broad-
casting the meetings by radio;
9. Issue oF instructions For pulling down and breaking the
statues of the late Shah and the present Shah with a view to
humiliating the royal household and encouraging insurgents to
rise against the constitutional monarchy in Iran;
9. Issue of instructions for the dissolution of the Majlis;
10. Issue of instructions for keeping under surveillance the
members of the royal household in Azerbaijan;
11. Issue of instructions for the unlawful arrest of General
Zahedi, the Prime Ainister appointed by the Shah, end the
offer of a reward to the person capturing him;
.12. Elimination of the royal anthem from the projram of
Tehran Radio; and
13. Action for the formation of a regency council by
referendum.
In connection with Brig. Gen. Taqi Riahi:
1. Arrest of Col. Nematollah Nasiri (now brigadier general)
who was carrying th:a order for Dr. Mosad3q's dismissal, and
other officers without any legal warrant;
2. Disarming of the Royal Guards;
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i&PLiNUIX sf.
3. Issue of instructions for the omission of the Shah's name
from the morning and evening prayers of the soldiers; and
4. Issue of instructions that the demonstrations of the
Tudeh Party should not be checked and insurgents should
not be prevented from making demonstrations against HIM the
Shah and that those people pulling down the statues of the
late Shah and those of the present Shah should not be checked.
By virtue of Article 317 of the Army Judicial and Punal Law, capital
punishm2nt was dumanded for the above-named. The case was referred to the
Court of First-Instance, which Court after performing the legal formalities
and investigating the case, aff,irmed that Or. Mosadeq's offences corres-
pondc.d with Article
'51-7
.11(
of the Army Judicial nd Pcnal Lw With due
re;ard to Article 1+13 of the Army Judicial and Penal Law, Article 44 of
the Criminal Code, and Article 46 of the same Law, since the accused is
over 60 years of age, he was condemned to three years of solitary imprison-
ment; General Riahi's offence was found to conform with paragraph (b) of
Article 330 of the Army Judicial and Penal Law and he was condemned to two
years of correctional imprisonment and permanent dismissal from the Army
(according to Article 298 of the Army Judicial and Penal Law).
Aftur th co=uoicatien of the verdict issued, the Military Prose-
cutor and the accused appealed for a revision according to Articles 217
and 218 of the Army Judicial and Penal Law and Article 219 of the same
Law. The case was ruferred to this Court aceording to File No.108, on
Decomr 26, 1953.
The Court of Revision was formed on April 8 after pass through the
necessary formalities, and listened in nine sessions to the explanations
of the Prosecutor and the objections of the accused and their defense
counsels about the defects of the file and the incompetence of the Court.
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APPENDIX F
Dr) Aoril 22, 1954, the orijinal memi:ers of the Court LI a majority vote
of six to one eid not Find the obj?ctions of th-2 accused and their
defense counsals about the defects of the file and incompentence of the
Court plausible, and declared their preparedness to investigate the
substance of the accusations levelled against Loth of the accused. The
Court of Revision, in 17 sessions held from April 23 to May 12, listened
to the objections of the Prosecutor, the accused, and their defense
counsels in respect to the verict issued by the Court of First Instance,
and to the last defences of the aLove-named. At 12;20 p.m. on May 12,
1554, it declared that the matter had been sufficiently debated and
announced an adjournment of the trial. The Court iwiediately started
its deliberations, and with due reLard to he substance of Article 209
of the Army Judicial and Penal Law completed the deliberations at 1:30 p.m.
on May 12, 1954, and issued the Following verdict:
Court's Verdict
A. The main objections of the Prosecutor and the accused to the
verdict issued by the Court of First Instance are as under:
Swilmary of the objections of the Army Prosecutor to the
verdict issued by the Court of First Instance in rejard
to Dr. riahammaJ Mosadeq.
1. HI's statements to the effect that he waived his claims
for the injustices rendered to him by the accused have been
intprpreted by the Court of First Instance as the pardoning
by HIM of his personal claims, while in fact a personal right
has a special interpretation from the judicial viewp,,int. The
Court's interpretation is not proper, lecause HIM the Shah had
not lodged a personal claim aGainst Jr. Mosadeq so that he could
withdraw his claim in due course.
2. Since the Court of 1-irst Instance has ruled that the crimes
attributed to Dr. MohamiaJ Mosa.2eq correspond with Article 317
of the Army Juc:icial Penal Law and has issued its verdict
with due re..;drd to ,rticle 46 of the Criminal Code, and since
the d'oove-named's crime is Lorne out LI the circumstances
mentionet.: in the a1.0ve, Or. Mohammad Mosac:eq apparently should
have Leen condemned to ten yi.ars' solitary confine.r,ent.
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3. Another mistake made Ly the Court is that reference has
been made in the verdict to Article 44 of the Criminal Coe,
while this Article refers to d mitigetion of the original
punishment, and Jr. MohanelaJ Hesadaq hes beer condemned to
three years solitary confineeee)t. These two fects ere
contrddictory.
4. The Court of First Instance has not stated in the verdict
whether the verdict was issued by a uneni;lous or majority vote.
Sum idry of the objections reised by the Army Prosecutor against
the Court's verdict in coenection with General Riahi.
1. The Court has not observed Articles 202 and 217 of the Army
Judicial and Penal Law (the Court's verdict must he substantiated
and borne out by facts in connection with the crimes attributed
to the accused and their conformity with the relevant regula-
tions). Moreover the subordinate punishment (dismissal from
Army service) which must never be mentioned in the verdict has
been mentioned contrary to Article 293 of the Army Judicial .
and Penal Law.
\
2. The Court's reasoning in regard to the defenses put up by _
the defense counsels of the accused supports the bill of -
indictment and the Prosecutor's statements made in the Court.
The Court has considered the General's actions as hostile and
as having been carried out with and for the purpose
of overthrowing the menarchy. However, the punishment decreed
has been made to conform with Article 330 of the Judicial L34,
the negligence of duty vis-a-vis the orders of the Army.
3. The Court has considered General Riahi responsible for the
actions attributed to him and has affirmed the bill of indictment;
but has made an oversight in fitting the crime to the relevant. -
article of the Law. For the Ceurt has in its verdict made clear
that the issue of the instructions for the omission of the Shah's
name from the morning and evening prayers, and the failure to
check the pulling down of the statues and the explicit announce-
ment that the Shah was a fugitive were meant to overthrow the
monerchy. Therefore the crime ceiwiitted by the above-named con-
forms with Article 317 of the Army Judicial and Penal Law.
i.e.,
Summary of the Objections Raised by General Riahi and his
Defense Counsel to the Verdict issued by the Court of First Instance:
1. With regard to Article 330 of the Army Judicial and Penal
Law, General Riahi was not nejlacting his military duties while
executing the orders of his superiors, so that the Court of First
Instance should not have condeened him according to Paragraph (b)
of Article 330 of the Army Judicial and Penal Lew.
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APPENDIX F
2. The Court has, by setting Forth its reasons, considered
that the Article referred to by the Prosecutor did not corres-
pond with the accusations levelled against General Riahi and
the Court exonerated the Fccused of the charges levelled against
him. Therefore, there were no grounds for the Army Prosecutor
to request that the same accusations be again levelled against
the accused.
3. During Aujust 1(.-19 Dr. Mohammad Mosadeq held a legal and
official title as far as all army officers were concerned and
no one was aware of the command dismissing him; hence the
legalization of Mosadeq's orders. Moreover, ever since HIM
the Shah ordained that General Riahi, the then Chief of General
Staff, should receive his orders directly from the then Minis-
ter of National' Defense, the Minister was the only lawful
commander of General Riahi.
4. In connection with the omission of the Shah's name from the
morning and evening prayers to which the Court has alluded, this
had nothing to do with the direct will of General Riahi, hence
the Article regarding the cancellation of an instruction could
not apply to him. The Commander of the officers' College asked
for instructions in this connection in order that probable -
incidents might be averted, and the then Chief of-General Staff
reported the matter to the Minister of National Defense and
communicated the order issued by the Minister.
The Summary of the Objections of Dr. Mohammad flosadeq and his
Lawyer to the Verdict of the Court of First Instance:
1. Concerning the arrest of Col. Nematollah Nasiri (presently
a brigadier general), if I meant to conceal the disposal order,
I would not have given a receipt for it. This order could not
possibly have remained a secret even though Colonel Hasiri was
arrested. His followers and some other no doubt knew of it.
He was detained because he had come to my house at 1:00 a.m.
to arrest me and complete his coup d'etat. When he understood
that the guards of my house were increased, he only submitted
the order of His Majesty.
2. The Court of First Instance said that I iisued a notice
about an imaginary coup d'etat in order to call the "oyal Guards
aggressors and to provoke the followers of His Majesty, and that
I detained the faithful servants of the monarch so that people
might be incited against this regime. I did not issue any order
to arrest the followers of the monarchy. The police forces were
responsible for all the actions which took place. The duty of
the Royal Suards is to protect His Majesty and the royal palaces.
It cannot arrest ministers or Majlis deputies.
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3. The Court of First Instance said that I ordered the
noyal Guards to be disarmed so that w'nen His Majestyreturned
he would have no one to protect him and hence the mobs
could have freedom of action. My purpose was to prevent
another coup d!etat.
4. You said that I sealed the royal palaces in order to
deprive His Majesty of his own properties. Oecause His
Majesty left the country without any previous notice, my
action was simply to protect the royal properties.
5. The Court of First Instance mentioned thi.i fact that tele-
grarii were sent to the Embassies of Iran in foreign countries,
forbidding the members to meet His dajesty. I have no know-
ledge of such telegrams and if Fatemi should say that I told
him to so so, I shall bear any punishment set by law.
6. The Court of First Instance also said that I ordered the
orlission of the name of His Majesty from the morning and
evening prayers of the soldiers. It was thought that His
Majesty did not wish to have his name prior to that of Iran,
so the order was given to the soldiers to pray only for the
perpetuity of Iran. rfter all, if the soldiers pray for the
perpetuity of Iran, this does not mean that treachery was
meant to his Majesty.
7. The Court of First Instance said that Mosadeq and his
Friends meant to insult His Majesty by allowing the people to
demonstrate and take part in meetings. Whenever the repre-
sentatives of the guilds or the Nationalpsa parties asked to
be allowed to demonstrate, they were given the right to do so
provided that the leftwing parties were not permitted to take
part, to talk, or to demonstrate. The meeting of thdt day had
no other basis. If the speakers said things and did wrong, it
was not my fault and I should not be blamed for their actions.
8. The Court of First Instance believed the destruction of the
statues of His Majesty and his father was to excite the people
aaainst His Majesty and his powers. I know nothing of the
destruction of the statues. In the first place, installation
of the statues was against the Shariat. I was told on August 17
that the leftoring parties intended to destroy the statues of
Reza Shah. If they would have done so, the Government would have
been accused of having cooperated with them. To prevent this,
the Nationalrisg parties and ouilds did so and their actions
were taken only on the basis of opinion an.-.; not to excite the
people against the monarchical regime.
9. About dissolving the Majlis, the Court of First Instance
said: "The proclatration of the accused to dissolve the Majlis
had no precedence in the parliamentary history of Iran and
indicates that he w,,nt to put an end to the parliamentary regime
and to the fundamentals of the government of this country." First
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APPENDIX F
I must say that if an act which has not been done before and is
not written in the laws is carried out, one cannot say that it
is a crime. Secondly, our Constitution is based upon govern-
ment of the people and by the people so a r'eferendum which is
also based on the same principles is completely logical and
legal. Thirdly, referendum is a good tool in the hands of
governments by which they can rely upon the people. .For these
reasons, a referendum was for the benefit of the country and
democracy.
10. About the arrest of the royal family in Azerbaiji-n I must
-say -that I knoef nothing and the police have done their duty.
11. The Court of First Instance referred to the order for the
imprisomoent of General Zahedi, the elected Prime Minister.
He was appointed after I was dismissed and because my govern-
ment could not arrest him, no crime has taken place that I
-maybe punished for.
12. The Court of First Instance thoul,ht that the omission of
the National Anthem from Radio Tehran was against the customs
of the country. I did not give an order for the omission of
the National Anthem, but I personally believe that some authori-
ties could cause trouble for those persons who go to places
for fun and hear the Anthem but might not honor it as they
should. I am sure you do not want the people to be bothered
by every possible method.
13. The Court referred to the formation of the Regency Counci
through a referendum. This action of mine is the Lest clue to
show that my deeds did not follow the contents of ixtiale 317
of the Army Judicial and Penal Law. If my deeds were according
to the three subjectsof that Article, I did not have to form d
Regency Council through a referendum. I intended to send some -
representktives to Rome so that they might beg His Majesty to
return or to appoint the Regency Council in case His Majesty did
not wish to return. If His Majesty would not appoint the Regency
Council, there was no Majlis and the Government had no right to
do so either. The only possible solution was through a referen-
dum,-which in turn is neither against the laws nor the benefits
of the country.
B. Considering the objections in the appeals of the Army Prosecutor,
Dr. Mohammad Mosadeq (accused No. 1), Gen. Taqi Riahi (accused Ho.'2)
and their lawyers, which seemed to be acceptable, for the following
reasons the verdict of the Court of First Instance is invalid:
In the case of Dr. Mohammad Mosadeq:
First, as the Army Prosecutor object, the Court of First Instance
thought that the communic;tion of the Royal court me..nt that His
Majesty overlooked his personal rights. This is not so because
His Majesty's position is so high that it Jnes not allow him to
- become a private plaintiff. Noreov.:r, the offense was not a
personal one so th8MatErended party would overlook his Tights.
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In ad :itirin to thAt, according to Article 1:5 of the Criminal
Code, pardon can only be given when the crime has be::n estab-
lished. For these 1�_,asons, the reference of the Court to the
above coanunication is invalid.
Secondly, considcring the nature of the accus tion and the
reasoning used by the Court of First Instance whereby it com-
pared the punishmtnt to that of Article 317 of the Army Judicial
and Penal Law, and observing frticic 46 of the Criminal Code,
the punishment fixed for him was soli try confinement. ecause
the said Article has fixed the maximum and minimum penalties of
solitary confinement, without taking the mitigating circumstances
into consideration, the period of solitary confinement could be
fixed without any trouble. Although the Court tried to reduce
the sentence and referred to Article 46 of the Criminal Code,
the effect of this Article is not noticed in the fixing of
the punishment.
In the.cast of G:neral Riahi:
According to Article 73 of the Constitution and Articles 202
and 21/ of the Army Judicial and Penal LdW, the verdict of the
Court had to be reasonable and the Court had to pay careful .
attention to the accusations. Not only is the verdict of the
Court about Sen. Taqi Riahi unreasonable, but also his deeds
do not correspond to section 6 of Article 33 of the Army Judicial
and Penal Law (this Article concerns the failure of comanders
to fulfill their military duties in special circumstances). On
the other hand, the Court cif First Instance reasoned that the
actions of Or. Aosadeq (accused No. 1) corresponded to rIrticle
317 of the Army Judicial and Penal Law. The Court also related
all the accusations ajainst General Riahi (accused No. 2) to
some of the deeds of Dr. liosadaq, directly and indirectly.
Therefore, the verdict was given on the basis of the unity of
their crimes, although considering their confessions, one can
see that the crimes were not the same for both of them. For
this reason the verdict of the Court of First Instance is not
correct.
For the 4bovereasons, the verdict of the Court of First Instance is-
cncelled in accordance with Article 233 of the Army Judicial and
Penal La.4 and the verdict of this Court is now announced for Dr.
Mosadeq (six votes to one) and General Riahi (five votes to two):
For Dr. ilosadeg:
He confessed to some of his crimes and by means of fallacious
anJ confusing arguments he tried to escape the punishment For
the rest. Considering his File and the testimony of witn'esses
in the Court, his defense did not influence the verdict of the
Court, ond none of it had any judicial value. His ibnorance
of some of the events (such AS the telegrams to Iranian ambassa-
2ors orderin.-J them not to meet His Majesty, Form:tion of meetings
through governmental facilitie, the speech at the meetin:; of
AusuSt 1, 1953 byghtittyn ratemi, who wa.; regarded by the
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:-.:ccuscd JS his Foreign Minister, the dIstruction of the
stututs of His Majesty und those of R.-Z.3 Shah, ,nd the arrest
of the royal family) does not seem acceptable because he Was
Prime Minister, though illegally, and accorng to Article
61 of the Constitution, a Prime Minister is responsible for
all events.
In some places he has shown good will such us concerning the
formetion of a Regency Council through a referendum about which
he frankly said, "Hy intentions were to send some representatives
to Rome in order to bcg His Majesty to return and if His Majesty
did not wish to do so, to beg him to appoint the Re,ency Council.
In case His Maj!sty did not agree to either of those two requests,
the Regency Council was to be appointed by a referendum." The
Prosecutor of this Court believes that his statement is neither
legal nor logi6a1; therefore he does not accept it. If Mosadeq
were right, he would have sent the representatives to Rome during
the four days of his illegal rime. Although he had all poss-
ible means of transportation ond so on in his hands, he did not
do so. No action was. taken for the adpointment of representatives
to be sent to Rome. His good will did not even induce him to
.send wires directly or indirectly (through the Embassies of Iran
in Baghdad and Rome) to His Majesty although he could have done
so. On the contrary, the telegrzms sent to the Iranian ambassa-
dors in Foreign countries show and prove that he did not intend
to show goodwill in this case.
Likowise in connection with the omission of the Shah's name from
the morning and evening prayers in military centers, his state-
ments are contradictory to those mode by Seneral Riahi because
the accused has stated: "Since it was assumed that HIA the Shah
did not wish his name to precede that of Iran, it was ordered
that the soldiers should pray for the country, in order that
HIM the Shah might reign in an independont and free country;
the morning and evening prayers of the soldiers For the continued
-
existence of Iran does not indicate any treason against HIM the
General Riahi has alleged that on the proposal of the 6omaander
of the Military College in order to prevent undesirable events
the prayer in question was changed with the advice of Dr. Mosa-
deq; however, the slid uccused (Dr. Mosadeq) has not been able
to prove his good will in alteriny the morning and evening
prayers or in omitting HIM the Shah's noole from the prayers,
and has not shown why he did not take this action 1.c:-ore
receiving his dismissal order, or how it hepp..!.nec: thot these
events which were ac.;ainst the monarchy occurred after the
issue of the dismissal order and his refusal to obey it.
Therefore, in short, the activities of the .!,,ov::-n.Ted from
ruf.ust 14:, at 1:00 a.m. until August 19, singly ond col lecti
clearly fall under Article 317 of the ,irmy Juliciol and Penal
Low. Consi,icring the fact that the %rooy Prosecutor applied for
a rovisinn of the verdict issued by the Court of First Instonc2,
o'ove-nomed is, by virtue of Article 317 of the la-my Judicial
ond ?viol Law, conJonned to three years of solitory ilorisoo-
went, considering the fact that his oge is over sixty years.
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,%P.'ENUIX F
The peria.2 of his :tnntion since August 15, 1953, m:/st )e
deducted from the period of his imiTi.sonmi;nt.
For nnneral Riehi:
In all the actions crim4itted by him, :Ieneral r.iahi's aim was
merely to facilitate the achievement of the aims of the
a ccused 1 (Or. losac'oq). :4:61: having full knowledge
of the aims and objectives of the.a! �ye named, he has
collueed with accused ao. 1 to waken the sense of royalty,
shnke thn position of the monarchy, eliminate the monuments
whicl) ineicatnd the existence of the monarchy, encourage the
0Jvers-ries of thl mon:Irchy and the army, and prosecute those
whose hearts were kindled with the fire for the love of the
king and the monarchy. The issue of the instruction for the
alteration of the morning and evening prayers by omitting the
Shah's name from the prayer, the despatch or tlegrams to the
6th Ar-ly Division of Fars and the Military Governor of Abadan
to the effect that the Shah was a fugitive, the fact thdt he
did not prevent the pulling down of the statues, and the
instruction for shooting on August 19 at individuals who mani-
fested their royal feelings are, in the opinion of. the jury,
sufficient proofs to corroborate his collaboration and complicity
with accused No. 1, Dr. Mohammad Mosadeq.
Therefore, the above-named was an accomplice of Or. Mohammad
Mosadeq, and by virtue of Article 317 of the Army Judicial and
Penal Law and Articles 23 and 29 of the Criminal Code, and
Article 30 of the said Law, he is condemned to three years
imprisonment with hard labor. The period of his detention
since August 19 will be deducted from his term of imprisonment.
An appeal may be made to the Supreme Court against the ahove verdict
within ten days of its decl:ration, with due rejard to the circumstances
mentioned in article 23 of the Army Judicial and Penal Law.
President of the Court of Revision for the Events of
August 16 to 19, 1353 ....General Javadi
Sign'ature of the Jury: lenral Isa Hedayat
Ebrahim Vali
General Nasrollah !ihoshnevisan
General Ahmad Ajudani (substitute)
General Esatollah Zarqami (assistant)
Lt.Col. AlAlyari, Army Prosecutor .
P;ay 12, 1954 (1:30 p.m.)
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Appendix G
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Arsenal
4 - Telegraph OfFice
5� U.Si. Lrnbay
6 - Police HQ
7 - Guards Barracks
3 - rhe Bazaar