Note: In 2015, I sent out the article below about the history of the US overturning the Iranian government in the 1950's. Given that Iran is yet again in the news, knowing this history of the CIA orchestrated coup in Iran, after WWII, is incredibly important as the consequences have been relevant to the dynamics in the Middle East ever since. This was the also first time the CIA had dismantled a government.
 

I need to also say that regarding the contemporary relationship with Iran, notwithstanding President Trump's recent debacle and confusion about it all,  I was so appreciative of President Obama's Nuclear Deal with Iran as a move toward peace in the Middle East and the world. It was the first time a US President had bravely gone against the directive of the Israeli government and AIPAC altogether:

First time in US history, an American president dares to oppose the pro-Israeli lobby AIPAC. The crisis deepening day by day upon the Iran nuke deal between the US and its biggest ally in the Middle East  - Israel.

U.S. President Barack Obama gave a strong message to the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC), the pro-Israel group that has been strongly opposing the Iran nuclear deal, in his meeting this week at the White House with the two executives of AIPAC. ( Global Research) 

Heather Gray

October 22, 2017

Justice Initiative International

Iran and Post WWII History

The Atlantic Charter and Iranian Independence Thwarted

Note: In this article I refer repeatedly to the late Iranian Prime Minister Mohammad Mosaddeq. According to the Encyclopedia Britannica, Mohammad Mosaddeq has a number of spellings such as Mosaddeq also spelled Masaddiq, or Mossadegh. I have chosen to use "Mosaddeq" from the "I ran Chamber Society".

The dialogue with the Iranians is a positive move on the part of the Obama administration and particularly that the U.S. Senate presented the White House with a victory on this agreement. This is encouraging, though it is still being negotiated in the House of Representatives at the time of this writing. However, relatively little history of the U.S. and its historic relationship with Iran is being shared. This is unfortunate as the consequences overall of U.S. disruptive policies have been profound on the Iranian people and the Middle East since the end of WWII.

To understand some of this we need to look again at the Atlantic Charter issued by U.S. President Franklin Roosevelt and British Prime Minister Winston Churchill in August 1941.

 

The Atlantic Charter was formulated by Roosevelt and Churchill when they came together in Newfoundland 1941. It was largely based on Roosevelt's State of the Union address to Congress in January 1941 in which he said " ....we look forward to a world founded upon four essential human freedoms" (1) freedom of speech and expression; (2) freedom of every person to worship God in their own way; (3) freedom from want; and (4) freedom from fear. ( Moyers)

Churchill was anxious for U.S. assistance in the war against Germany so agreed to the Charter.

 

 

The eight principal points of the Charter were:

2  territorial adjustments must be in accord with the wishes of the peoples concerned;

3  all people had a right to self-determination;

4  trade barriers were to be lowered;

5  there was to be global economic cooperation and advancement of social welfare;

6  the participants would work for a world free of want and fear;

7  the participants would work for freedom of the seas;

8  there was to be disarmament of aggressor nations, and a post-war common   disarmament. ( Wikipedia)

 

Sounds good doesn't it? One of the more controversial of the principles was the third one, as in " All people had a right to self-determination". Almost immediately, countries suffering from colonial oppression in various parts of the world confronted Churchill about this. Churchill refused to accept the universality of the Charter, and inferred it was meant for Britain threatened by Nazi control and not for those under Britain's colonial rule. Churchill's response led to major accusations of hypocrisy of Churchill himself and European imperialists/colonialists overall in the West.

 

Roosevelt, on the other hand, implied that "Principle Three" of self-determination applied universally, but he was not overt about it.

In the long run, however, the hypocrisy of not adhering to the principles of the Atlantic Charter rests with both the U.S. and British governments in subsequent years.

 

At the time, many throughout the world appropriately compared Nazism to colonialism. As in, Europeans were alarmed at oppressive forced labor and dictatorial behavior by the Germans being utilized on them yet they employed similar tactics and oppression in their colonies in Africa and elsewhere. Some stated that the Germans learned their techniques of oppressive tactics from their own colonies and from that of other Europeans, which makes sense.

Hypocrisy of this type formed the basis for many postwar anticolonial theorists' rejection of making arguments based on Western pronouncements and values. (Franz) Fanon observed with disgust that Western discourse is "never done talking of Man" and yet bases itself on raw violence directed against humans. Likewise, Aimé Césaire condemned European humanistic idealism, which he dubbed "pseudo-humanism," since it "has diminished the rights of man"....

Hence, Césaire showed that Europeans' outrage directed itself not toward Nazism itself, but rather "the fact that [Hitler] applied to Europe colonialist procedures which until then had been reserved exclusively" for the "darker peoples" of the world. Europeans applied the rule of colonial difference to their moral and legal condemnation of Nazism, by approving of its application in the non-Western world but rejecting its application in Europe.... Césaire saw similar inconsistency in Europe's vocal condemnation of Hitler's violence against European victims, but silence on Nazi-like methods applied to "Algiers, Morocco, and other places" of contemporary colonial violence. ( Reeves)

 

Recent historians have also referred to the Churchill hypocrisy when comparing British colonialism to Nazism. For example, Indian historian M.S. Venkataramani noted "Winston Churchill governed more alien millions the world over than Adolf Hitler did at the zenith of his power." ( Reeves)

Iran was somewhat caught in the middle of the struggles in the Middle East regarding the major protagonists during WWII and was invaded by the British, the Soviets and others.

Iran, then, had ultimately assisted the allies in offering a route for resources to the Soviets and was acknowledged for this at the conference in Tehran. In fact, the Tehran Conference took place in 1943. Russia's Joseph Stalin, Britain's Winston Churchill, and the U.S. Franklin Roosevelt were in attendance. The following document was signed by the three leaders and in which is stated at the end " in accordance with the principles of the Atlantic Charter":

 

Joseph Stalin, Franklin Roosevelt, and Winston Churchill at Tehran Conference (Iran 1941)

The President of the United States, the Premier of the U. S. S. R. and the Prime Minister of the United Kingdom, having consulted with each other and with the Prime Minister of Iran, desire to declare the mutual agreement of their three Governments regarding their relations with Iran.

 

The Governments of the United States, the U. S. S. R., and the United Kingdom recognize the assistance which Iran has given in the prosecution of the war against the common enemy, particularly by facilitating the transportation of supplies from overseas to the Soviet Union.

 

The Three Governments realize that the war has caused special economic difficulties for Iran, and they are agreed that they will continue to make available to the Government of Iran such economic assistance as may be possible, having regard to the heavy demands made upon them by their world-wide military operations, and to the world-wide shortage of transport, raw materials, and supplies for civilian consumption.

 

With respect to the post-war period, the Governments of the United States, the U. S. S. R., and the United Kingdom are in accord with the Government of Iran that any economic problems confronting Iran at the close of hostilities should receive full consideration, along with those of other members of the United Nations, by conferences or international agencies held or created to deal with international economic matters.

 

The Governments of the United States, the U. S. S. R., and the United Kingdom are at one with the Government of Iran in their desire for the maintenance of the independence, sovereignty and territorial integrity of Iran They count upon the participation of Iran, together with all other peace-loving nations, in the establishment of international peace, security and prosperity after the war, in accordance with the principles of the Atlantic Charter, to which all four Governments have subscribed.

 

J. STALIN

FRANKLIN D ROOSEVELT
( ademocraticiran )

First, Iran was promised only $500,000 from the U.S. government for its trials and tribulations during the war to assist the allies, while the Europeans received 1.2 billion from the U.S. through loans or grants from the U.S. Marshall Plan ( Wikipedia).

 

Iran was rewarded with only $500,000 in (U.S.) Point IV aid and the promise of a $25m loan. That loan would never be awarded however as nationalism quickly swept post-war, symbolized by the rise of Mohammad Mosaddeq to the office of prime minister in 1951. 

Within 10 years of this historic Tehran Conference, the first and only democratically elected Iranian Prime Minister, Mohammad Mosaddeq , was ousted by the CIA. As the first Iranian to receive a Doctorate of Law (acquired in 1913 from the University of Neuchatel in Switzerland) and with the Cold War in place at the time, it is also important to note that Mosaddeq was neither a communist nor a radical Islamist. Emulating Roosevelt's policies, Mosaddeq had plans for a "New Deal" type government to benefit the Iranian masses, and sought ways to fund his program through economic independence.
 

Mosaddeq was elected Prime Minister in 1951 prior to which he had presented the idea of Iranian oil nationalization to the Iranian people. Mosaddeq wanted opportunities and reforms for his country outside western influence, which he realized could not be achieved without "economic" independence. Britain at the time, however, largely controlled the Iranian economy through its dominance of the Iranian oil industry. ( International Man)

 

Mosaddeq also mistakenly thought Iran was a sovereign nation. Whether deliberately or not, he was also attempting to adhere to Principal Three of the Atlantic Charter regarding self-determination, much to the chagrin of the British and the United States. Ultimately, the issue was Iranian "oil" and the British were not about to give up on that valuable resource they had controlled since 1908.

 

In 1908, a sizable deposit of oil was found in Masjed Soleiman, Iran and the British company the Anglo-Persian Oil Company (APOC) was created. In 1935 it became the Anglo-Iranian Oil Company. Importantly, Stephen Kinzer, author of All the Shah's Men: An American Coup And The Roots of Middle East Terror, notes that this company was the largest in the British Empire (Democracy Now ). He says further that " the Iranian oil is actually what maintained Britain at its level of prosperity and its level of military preparedness all throughout the '30s, the '40s, and the '50s". (  Democracy Now )

However, Iran only received 25% of the proceeds of the oil industry. In fact, politically conscious Iranians were aware, however, that the British government derived more revenue from taxing the concessionaire, the Anglo-Iranian Oil Company, than the Iranian government derived from royalties. ( Iran Chamber)

 

As Prime Minister, Mosaddeq reasonably wanted to do an audit of the oil company but the British denied this request. In the early 1950's, the Iranians also discovered that Americans had established a 50/50 deal with the Saudi oil entities known as the Saudi-Aramco agreement. The Iranians also attempted this 50/50 concept with the British but were rebuffed. Finally in 1951, the Iranians nationalized the oil industry altogether.

 

U.S. President Harry Truman in Iran visiting Mohammad Mosaddeq 1951

Britain was outraged by the Iranian nationalization of the oil industry and wanted to overturn the Iranian government. U.S. President Truman was, apparently, somewhat sympathetic to Mosaddeq's demands or vacillated on the issue and would not agree to the British invasion of Iran. Yet according to Stephen Kinzer, Truman also thought he could talk Mosaddeq out of the nationalization scheme. That didn't work.  By 1953 a more conservative and Republican administration under Dwight Eisenhower approved the ousting by the CIA of the Mosaddeq government. It was known as "Operation Ajax" and it marked the first time the CIA had overturned a government.

 

MI6, the UK's foreign spy agency, and the CIA would organize the coup. Kermit Roosevelt, a grandson of former US President Teddy Roosevelt, was the CIA officer in charge.

 

The goal was to return the monarchy of Mohammad Reza Shah Pahlavi (also known as "the Shah") to power. (In Farsi, the Persian language, "shah" means "king.")

 

The CIA and MI6 used classic methods of subterfuge. They paid Iranian goons to pose as communists and wreak havoc in Tehran, the Iranian capital, and vandalize its business district. The police couldn't restrain them, and the violence grew. ( International Man )

In 2013, the 60th anniversary of the ousting of Mosaddeq, the CIA released documents affirming its involvement in the coup ( RT Question More) The British papers about the coup remain secret even though, according to the Guardian, Iranian school children know all the details of the coup. ( Guardian)

 

In 2009 the former foreign secretary Jack Straw publicly referred to many British "interferences" in 20th-century Iranian affairs. (Following the CIA release of U/S. involvement, the British) Foreign Office said it could neither confirm nor deny Britain's involvement in the coup. ( Guardian )

 

Mosaddeq was not killed but ultimately placed under house arrest for the rest of his life.

 

The British and Americans placed the accommodating Shaw (i.e. King) as ruler of Iran. Britain wanted to go back to the previous arrangement of controlling the oil industry altogether but public sentiment in Iran at this point was so opposed to this that the British had to capitulate. As a result, also under pressure from the U.S., a consortium holding company was incorporated in London in 1954 called the Iranian Oil Participants Ltd (IOP). It was composed of British, American, Dutch and French oil interests. Iran was to receive 50% of the oil profit (emulating the Saudi-Aramco arrangement) but Iran was not allowed to audit the industry nor could Iranians serve on the board of directors.

 

In Iran, the IOP continued to operate until the Islamic Revolution in 1979 when the Ayatollah Khomeini confiscated all of the company's assets in Iran... and annulled the 1954 agreement and all regulations pertaining to it. ( Wikipedia) 

Summary

Since the 1979 Islamic Revolution in Iran, there has been a wide range of sanctions against Iran imposed by the United States, the United Nations and the European Union. Click here for a summary of the sanctions.

Both the Shah and the Ayatollah Khomeini were not democratically elected as was Mosaddeq. It is rather mind boggling to speculate as to what might have happened had the U.S. not overturned the Iranian government in 1953 and instead had assisted the Iranians in having control over their own oil resource and respected the democratic process in Iran by adhering to the Atlantic Charter and Principle Three's concept of "self-determination". Nevertheless, the Iranians have suffered from isolation and economic sanctions from the west largely because some sectors decided to take the situation into their own hands rather than serving the dictates of the United States or the West overall. As Noam Chomsky notes:

 

Hopefully with the recent acceptance of the agreement with the Iranians in the U.S. Senate and the possible projected lifting of the sanctions against Iran, opportunities for the Iranians might again be in the offing. It is an exciting prospect.

 

Conclusion

What had begun, in the words of Franklin D. Roosevelt as "an example of what we could do by an unselfish foreign policy" ended in ignominy that continues to this day.... the feelings and aspirations that were enshrined in the Iran Declaration seem a world away today. ( ademocraticiran )

The unfortunate lesson of it all was that the United States sent a message to the Middle East and to the world at large, that the United States was not interested in democratic systems and processes.  As Stephen Kinzer noted:

Further, it appears that the principles of the 1941 Atlantic Charter are not something the United States and Europe are willing to adhere to particularly if it regards threats of access to capital, control of labor and control of raw materials, such as oil and/or access to seeds and control of seeds in the agricultural sector and many other examples.

The disruptive Republican members of the House of Representatives in their opposition to the Iranian agreement are yet again arrogantly displaying their disdain for a semblance of justice and respect for the other. Nor are they adhering to Roosevelt's directive of " what we could do by an unselfish foreign policy" and/or the possibility of dialogue and negotiation.  As they say in southern Africa, " A luta continua" - the struggle continues!  

Heather Gray is the producer of "Just Peace" on WRFG-Atlanta 89.3 FM covering local, regional, national and international news. She has been involved in agriculture advocacy and communications for 25 years in the United States and internationally. She lives in Atlanta, Georgia and can be reached at [email protected]