“Psychological warfare” was one of most important dimensions of the coup operation and part of the plan from its first conceptions. In the weeks leading to the coup, this aspect of the operation became very important. Propaganda cartoons and articles…
This archival film made by the US Army in late 1950s or early 1960s promotes the role of MAAG personnel in Iran. The Big Picture: Assignment Iran The US Military had been active in Iran and involved in various bilateral…
16 Azar, 7 December, became the official Student Day in Iran after the 1979 Revolution. But even before 1979, students across the country marked the day in defiance against the Pahlavi regime because on that day in 1953 three students…
Abadan, the “modern oil city”, in southern Iran, was a segregated city in the 1940s and 1950s, and the subject of the promotional film “Persian Story” commissioned by Anglo-Iranian Oil Company. Living conditions for most of AIOC’s non-British oil workers…
For years the United States official myth was that the US was an “honest mediator” in the Iran-UK dispute over the Iranian oil industry; that the US had only humanitarian and idealistic interests in its involvements in Iran. However, from…
– Just how important is Iran? – There is a great reserve of oil in that area and we’re interested in oil reserves. And if Iran should go through a revolution or a foreign country should take over Iran it’s…
The infamous SAVAK, the Iranian secret intelligence organization operating 1957-1980 and known for widespread spying on Iranians, arrests, disappearances, horrific torture chambers and prisons, was a direct product of the coup. Quotes below from Gasiorowsky, M, “Central Intelligence Agency in…
Max Thornburg, a Standard Oil executive, acted as a consultant to the Iranian government in 1951, reviewing the “Supplementary Agreement” recently proposed by Britain. Here in this interview on Longines Chronoscope, he opins that the oil nationalization was a “tragically…
From Abrahamian, E., A History of Modern Iran (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2010). Tudeh raised for the first time the demand for nationalization of the British-owned oil industry. On May Day in 1946, the British consul in Khorramshahr noted in…
Conditions of life and work for the AIOC’s Iranian oil workers in Abadan during 1930s and 1940s, prior to the nationalization. Source: Farmanfarmaian, M. and R. Farmanfarmaian. Blood and Oil: Memoirs of a Persian Prince. NY: Random House, 1997. Pp.184-5.…
The image posted in this post was taken on 30th Tir, an uprising in support of Mossadeq’s bid to remove from the control of the Shah the appointment of the War Minister and thus the control of the military. [Mossadeq]…
Some bits from various sources on the recruitment of local Nazis by the CIA in the coup operation. Amongst the local Nazi supporters was Fazlolah Zahedi, the Iranian leader of the coup who became premier upon its success. Iranian fascists…
I don’t know who has made this video. It looks like a home production, given the sound track. It has good historical information, with some minor misses, and gives a sketch of the coup particularly in the context of oil…
More about 30th Tir here. Note and picture contributed by Parvin: تجارتخانه و حجره کوچک پدر و عمویم در بازار. پنجره عقبی این حجره رو به حیاط بزرگ مسجد شاه باز میشد، قبل از دو رقمی شدن سنم، هر از…
Darker text if from Wilber narrative. Lighter is from Abrahamian, “The 1953 Coup in Iran,” Science & Society, Vol. 65, No. 2 (Summer, 2001), pp. 182-215 This paper, entitled Overthrow of Premier Mossadeq of Iran, was written in March 1954…
Today is the first day this blog is being used. So far we’ve been working at the development site. So this really is the first entry. Today was my first day back at the writing since November 16, the Paper…
An older interview on Democracy Now on the occasion of the 50th anniversary of the coup. Note the different readings offered by Kinzer and Abrahamian. Kinzer’s is an action film scenario complete with a “fantastic cast of characters in the…
Bleow is a very enlightening lecture by Ervand Abrahamian who is a foremost authority on the coup. His book Coup: 1953, CIA and the Roots of Modern US-Iranian Relations has just been published. Abrahamian refutes claims made by liberal US…
This is the link to Wilber’s 1954 report which is one of the few (partially) revealed CIA documents. Wilber was the one designated by the CIA to come up with the plan for the coup. So he is in fact…