Under Mohammad Mossadegh’s leadership, an emergent political formation called the National Front faced a crisis after nationalizing the British-owned Anglo-Iranian Oil Company. Fears that the National Front was a communist-inspired movement led the British and American governments to mount a coup that, after overthrowing Mossadegh, restored a clearly pro-Western regime.
Iran was the first Middle Eastern country to grant an oil-production concession to a foreign party, the Australian William d’Arcy, in 1901. After World War I, extension of Western oil exploration in the Middle East also brought concessions to neighboring Arab states, including the new kingdoms of Iraq and Saudi Arabia. Although oil issues were important in Iran—producing in 1933 the Anglo-Iranian Oil Company
Following the joint Soviet and British occupation of Iran
Historians suggest that, once Soviet pressures were removed, attention in Iranian nationalist circles started to focus on the British-held AIOC concession. The nationalists’ aim was to improve Iran’s economy by negotiating higher revenues from oil resources. This goal joined other planks in the electoral platform of National Front
The National Front vied for support from nationalists and from voters who sought changes in traditional elitest bases of Iranian politics. Other elements supported Mossadegh more out of traditional opposition to the absolute authority of Mohammad Reza Shah Pahlavi
Such observations help explain why, when Mossadegh would stake everything on the oil nationalization issue, the unity of the National Front crumbled. The dilemma began early in 1951, when the Iranian parliament, the Majlis,
The situation declined sharply after the March 7, 1951, assassination of Razmara by a member of the terrorist movement Fadayan-e Islam (Sacrificers for Islam). The event opened the way for Mossadegh’s possible candidacy as prime minister—presumably as a spokesman for the more radical tactics regarding oil put forward by nationalists within the National Front. Then, on March 15, 1951, the Majlis passed the nationalization bill, and in April Mossadegh became prime minister.
For a time, no one knew what Great Britain might do to get Iran back to the negotiating table. A serious watershed came with the 1952 elections for the seventeenth Majlis, revealing divisions in nationalist ranks. Fewer than half of the elected members of Parliament were clearly behind Mossadegh, and by midyear more skeptical supporters fell by the wayside. Some may have sensed that Great Britain and the United States had signaled that, if a more moderate leader replaced Mossadegh, a chance to reopen negotiations might result.
One result of the growing disunity was to force Mossadegh to take measures he probably would not have considered earlier. One was rather vague: to allow the appearance that the communist-backed Tudeh (which had stopped denouncing Mossadegh midway through 1952) might be offered a greater role. Other measures suggesting Mossadegh’s willingness to use dictatorial methods worried many middle-class elements, who were hoping for more signs of democratic progress.
The evolving situation created by the oil crisis left the regime open to the danger of overthrow by a number of alienated groups. For a short time, after Mossadegh resigned after a rift with the shah, the moderate Ahmad Qavam,
Additional fractures within Mossadegh’s camp emerged early in 1953. Key figures such as National Front secretary Hossein Maki,
As the situation deteriorated, it became apparent that Western interests would seek a way to reverse what the Mossadegh government had done. What would take place in August of 1953 was essentially a staged coup undertaken with the covert backing of the Central Intelligence Agency
Since the coup, labeled by the CIA Operation Ajax,
Changing conditions on the global stage of petroleum production and marketing after 1945 made it inevitable that there would be demands to alter obvious imbalances in interwar concessions in several regions of the Middle East, not only Iran. Whereas regimes such as those in Saudi Arabia and the Gulf emirates were relatively unsophisticated (the latter still under British tutelage), Iran had had a series of very important experiences, both of nationalist representative upsurges (especially an early twentieth century constitutional effort that failed) and strong executive leadership under the first Pahlavi Shah, Reza Shah Pahlavi
The petroleum industry, which was mainly a foreign private venture, seemed to offer that leverage, but the Cold War changed this, sounding alarms that penetrated high governmental circles. Iranian support for an aggressive policy toward the AIOC not only was political but also involved a belief that Iran’s economic development potential depended on rapid expansion of oil revenues that could be used by the nation’s increasingly technocratic leadership. Mossadegh’s experience dashed this hope (throughout the Middle East), at least for two more decades.
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Gasiorowski, Mark, and Malcolm Byrne, eds. Mohammad Mossadeq and the 1953 Coup in Iran. Syracuse, N.Y.: Syracuse University Press, 2004. Benefitting from extensive archives made public only after several decades, this book is probably the most detailed and objective study of the background to the 1953 coup. -
Keddie, Nikki R. Modern Iran: Roots and Results of Revolution. New Haven, Conn.: Yale University Press, 2003. Written by one of the most recognized scholars of twentieth century Iran, this history places the Mossadegh era in a broader perspective. -
Kinzer, Stephen. All the Shah’s Men: An American Coup and the Roots of Middle East Terror. New York: John Wiley & Sons, 2003. A carefully documented study condemning not only the events of the mid-1950’s but also attempts by various governments and interests to “cover up” the machinations leading to Mossadegh’s downfall.
Tehran Conference Promotes Allied Cooperation in Iran