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“Will all great Neptune’s ocean wash this blood clean from my hand?”
-The Tragedy of Macbeth, by William Shakespeare
Throughout the premiership of Dr. Mossadegh, from 1951 to 1953, and because of the popular democratic movement that had started during the Second World War, there existed relative freedoms in the Iranian society. People, especially the youth, were involved in all kinds of political and social activities. Students, women, intellectuals, and artists organized themselves. Labor unions and peasant organizations were quite active and were growing rapidly. Different political parties, either legally or semi-legally, were functioning. Seeds of an ever growing civil society were planted and the flower of democracy was starting to grow.
But this movement and Dr. Mossadegh’s government had strong foes. The Shah, his court, and the British Empire tried to undermine the premiership of Dr. Mossadegh with hopes of ultimately bringing him down. Right after the nationalization of oil the British imposed a blockade and sent their navy to the Persian Gulf. They even threatened to invade the city of Abadan and take over the great refinery and the oil fields of the south. One tool that the Shah, the military high command, and their surrogates used to undermine Dr. Mossadegh was repression. Although Dr. Mossadegh was a firm believer in democracy, civil liberties, and the rule of law, he never used his power to lift the martial law and to put a stop to the repression against leftist and other nationalist forces. The Shah used this to his advantage. People would get beaten, arrested, jailed, tortured, and killed because of their party affiliation or even peaceful activities. This undermined the popularity of Mossadegh, even though these actions were ordered by the court and not his government. On two occasions the Shah and the military high command ordered the army to brutally crush peaceful demonstrations and to frighten the public and undermine Mossadegh. The first was July 14th, 1951 (23rd of Tir, 1330) where more than 100 unarmed demonstrators were killed in Baharestan square in Tehran and hundreds more were injured, including a woman whose legs were crushed (and later amputated) as a Sherman tank rolled over her. The second was during the popular uprising of July 21, 1952 (30th of Tir, 1331) where many people were killed in Tehran and other cities.
But all of these actions could not stop the mass democratic movement. The Shah and the British, who had lost most of their network in Iran, turned to the U.S. The Truman administration was reluctant to overthrow Mossadegh. But things changed when the new Republican administration came to power in Washington in 1952. The CIA launched operation AJAX with its headquarters in the US embassy in Tehran.
Things came to a head in the summer of 1953. The CIA had everything ready and the first attempt to overthrow the government came on August 16th 1953. The royal order to dismiss Mossadegh was prepared by the CIA agents and signed by the Shah. This order was taken, by a detachment of soldiers and officers loyal to the Shah, to the prime minister’s residence. But earlier that day Dr. Mossadegh was warned about the impending coup by officers who were members of the military organization of the Tudeh Party. So when the soldiers came to Mossadegh’s residence, they were promptly arrested by the prime minister’s guards. The coup was foiled. The Shah escaped and went to Iraq and then to Italy. General Zahedi went into hiding under the protection of the US embassy. Kermit Roosevelt did the same.
When the people found out, they became jubilant and came to the streets to celebrate the coup’s defeat. They also showed their anger at the Shah by pulling down some of his and Reza Shah’s statues. Dr. Fatemi, Iran’s foreign minister, made fiery speeches against the monarchy. Some members of the Tudeh Party and Mossadegh’s National Front even called for the establishment of a republic in light of what was considered to be treason committed by the Shah. At this historical moment, Dr. Mossadegh made his first fatal error that sealed his fate and that of his government and the people of Iran. He ordered the military to clear the streets and declared any demonstration illegal. Through this action the streets were cleared of the main obstacle in front of the conspirators and Dr. Mossadegh’s main source of support: the masses of people. Anyone, who demonstrated against the monarchy or the attempted coup, was subject to arrest or even being shot at, as a number of people who did got killed. Also, the military was able to position itself in strategic locations throughout the city of Tehran ready to strike. The CIA again prepared to mount a new coup three days later.
It was a warm sunny day on Wednesday, August 19th, 1953. The units of the military loyal to the Shah went into action seizing one important location after another and military units loyal to Mossadegh didn’t engage them as much as they should have. Mobs of CIA hired thugs and hooligans, headed by Shabon Jaafari (Shaban the Brianless), and escorted by military units, started to march from south of Tehran harassing people and trying to gather support for the coup. Supporters of Dr. Mossadegh, both from the leftist and nationalist forces, were confused and didn’t come to the streets due to the repression of the previous three days. They urged Dr. Mossadegh to go to the national radio and make a plea to the people to come to the streets and oppose the coup. Some requested the government to arm the people so the coup could be crushed. Dr. Mossadegh made his second fatal mistake by opposing both requests. Soon after, the national radio fell to the hands of the coup plotters. There on the radio General Zahedi announced the fall of Dr. Mossdegh’s government and the establishment of the new military regime. The units of the Imperial Guard, using the resources from the US embassy, attacked the prime minister’s residence and a three hour battle ensued. The prime minister’s guards fought valiantly, but they were overrun by the superior force of the Imperial Guard. Scores of people were killed and the house was ransacked. Dr. Mossadegh and his close associates were able to escape, but to the surprise of many, surrendered themselves the next day.
On that day three years of relative freedom, independence, and the start of a genuine democracy was destroyed. The dark years of repression and dictatorship began again. Soon after the coup the Shah returned to Iran and personally thanked the CIA for rescuing his throne. Dr. Mossadegh was tried and sent into internal exile in his hometown, where he died in 1967. Thousands were arrested, exiled, jailed, tortured, and killed or executed by the new regime, a majority of which were members and supporters of Tudeh Party. Officers of the Tudeh Party’s military organization were the first to be executed. Dr. Fatemi was also executed. Hundreds fled the country in order to save themselves. The new military regime negotiated an oil deal with the western oil companies. The British got a part of this deal, but the real winners were the American oil companies which received 40% share of the Iranian oil. Also, the US created a perfect surrogate with the Shah’s regime. The Shah would turn Iran into a US stronghold in the vital Middle Eastern region. In the north the US built a series of spy stations against the Soviet Union. The Shah would act as the police man of the region, such as the time when he sent troops to Oman in the 1970’s to crush the popular uprising there. The Shah would turn the Iranian economy almost entirely dependent on western corporations. He would enrich the American arms manufacturers, to the tune of billions of dollars, by spending the precious oil revenue on the purchase of unnecessary armaments, and Iran would once again be populated by thousands of foreign military and economic advisors, this time mostly Americans. The Shah and his family became some of the richest people in the world. Any opposition to his policies would be brutally crushed and this job was superbly done by the CIA and Israeli trained secret service: The SAVAK. The torture chambers of the SAVAK were host to Communists, Socialists, Nationalists, and Muslim activists. Many would find their tombs in these chambers.
The 1953 coup in Iran was the first of its kind by the CIA. The agency went on to do similar operations in other countries, some successful, and some not so successful. In 1954 it was the turn of Guatemala, in 1961 it was in the Congo and the Bay of Pigs in Cuba, in 1965 it was in Indonesia where close to a million people were killed after the coup, and on September 11th,1973 it was in Chile when democracy was destroyed and a fascist regime came to power. The ones mentioned above form an incomplete list of operations. The interesting fact regarding all these interventions is that the people at the receiving end of these operations knew who was responsible, the US government knew the facts, but the people who were always kept in the dark were the great majority of the American people. To this day many do not know what happened in Iran in 1953, which caused the revolution and the hostage crisis of 1979.
The destiny of Iran and the whole Middle East changed because of the 1953 coup. At least two generations of Iranians suffered the consequences of the Operation AJAX. It is time for reparations for the victims and their families of this great crime against a whole nation. At least, it is time for an official apology to the Iranian people, so this painful and bloody chapter in modern history can be closed.
Correction: In the previous article, it was written that President Obama’s speech at Cairo University was in May of 2009. His speech was delivered in June of 2009.
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