Very British Deception: Iran Coup’s Hidden History

Over four days from August 15th, the 60th anniversary of the CIA and MI6 coup that overthrew Iranian Prime Minister Mohammad Mossadeq is marked. Working in tandem, British and American spies waged a devastatingly effective covert campaign using saboteurs, staged protests, false flag bombings, assassinations, and much more besides, which ultimately ushered in two-and-a-half decades of brutal, dictatorial rule by Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi.

By this point, the coup’s history is fairly well-known, not least because the CIA has openly admitted responsibility for the mass violence and upheaval that unseated Mossadeq on that fateful day. Many documents outlining its cloak-and-dagger activities during this period are in the public domain. Conversely, Britain has never acknowledged MI6’s central role in the connivance. Now, the sordid tale - or, what can be pieced together from an incomplete, thoroughly weeded archival record - must be told.

‘Stolen Property’

In May 1951, Iran’s parliament almost unanimously backed Mossadeq’s proposal to nationalize Britain’s Anglo-Iranian Oil Company (AIOC), and expropriate its assets. The move was almost universally popular, instantly making the Prime Minister a hero, nationally and beyond. Many believed London’s dominance and exploitation of West Asia was finally over, and for the first time in centuries, local citizens would take charge of their own affairs, and profit from their region’s vast oil wealth.

As such, from Britain’s perspective, Mossadeq’s radical anti-imperial program could neither be tolerated, nor come to pass. Through the AIOC, Iran’s resources were exploited, and her population impoverished. Under a deal inked in 1901 set to last until 1993, London garnered over 80% of the Company’s profits. Moreover, AIOC workers and their families toiled and lived in horrific conditions, while the firm’s British chiefs in staggering opulence.

London’s Joint Intelligence Committee remarked on the AIOC’s nationalization with typically dishonest, British restraint: “the situation in Persia has taken an unfortunate turn.” Devastated and irate officials in Whitehall immediately began strategizing how to rid themselves of the troublesome Mossadeq and reverse the nationalization, before other countries in the region and beyond got similar ideas. 

The first step was to impose sanctions banning Iran’s import of British commodities including steel and sugar, freeze Tehran’s bank accounts in London, and a Royal Navy embargo, under which any ship in the region suspected of transporting Iranian oil was seized for carrying “stolen property”. Direct military intervention was also considered, but eventually ruled out by Prime Minister Clement Attlee. Instead, Mossadeq was to be dislodged via subversion and subterfuge.

Accordingly, British intelligence sought to create a social and political climate inside Iran conducive to violent revolution, in a manner that would keep London’s meddling hand concealed in the event of successful insurrection. This included secretly building a network of local opposition actors to agitate for Mossadeq’s removal through a number of provocative if not outright incendiary methods, and deluging local and international media with black propaganda about the Prime Minister and his allies and supporters.

Some assets were recruited due to their personal and/or political dislike of Mossadeq, others - including local politicians and lawmakers - were bribed. MI6 also paid newspaper editors and journalists to publish damaging stories about Mossadeq. Historian Rory Cormac records how, in April 1952, US State Department officials privately commented with some interest on how almost the entire Iranian media had become hostile to the Prime Minister, apparently ignorant this was London’s explicit doing.

Around this time, parliamentary elections were due to be held in Iran. Mossadeq suspected Britain intended to somehow corrupt proceedings and destabilize the country, so postponed the vote, then resigned. London lobbied Shah Pahlavi to replace him with pro-British Ahmad Qavam. That failed when mass pro-government protests immediately erupted - within a week, the Prime Minister was reinstated. A Foreign Office internal memo bitterly lamented:

“The wheels of Islam need more lubricating than those of other faiths.” 

Suitably emboldened, and having reached the end of his tether over nationalization, Mossadeq then broke off diplomatic relations with London outright, expelling its Embassy staff and all known MI6 officers operating in his country. Wounded, British intelligence scrapped its coup plans. Still, the regime change coast was far from clear in Tehran, as the Prime Minister - and Iranian people he served - would soon find out.

‘Made in England’

Despite the agency’s unceremonious formal expulsion, MI6 continued to direct destabilizing actions in Iran through a secret communications network. Hardly sufficient to precipitate Mossadeq’s downfall, the British turned to their US counterparts, who could still act in Tehran. However, neither the CIA nor the White House nor State Department was interested. At least initially.

At this time, Mossadeq enjoyed cordial relations with officials in Washington, who viewed him as a useful ally in their global fight against Communism. It is largely unknown today that in Autumn 1951, he toured the country for six weeks, attempting to drum up political and public support. In many speeches, the Iranian leader drew comparisons between America’s struggle for independence from Britain, and his own oil nationalization ambitions. Typically, audiences - and the mainstream press - were highly receptive.

Mossadeq in America

Fast forward a year though, and London’s determined efforts to batter down US support for Mossadeq were beginning to bear fruit. In November 1952, a British embassy official in Washington formally suggested the CIA and State Department consider a coup to remove the Prime Minister. Along the way, the Americans were falsely led to believe MI6 had a well-developed plan involving its own agents in Iran, all but certain of success. All the Americans needed to do was grant the green light.

While the CIA was amenable, State balked, arguing there was scope for failure, and Western sponsorship to be exposed. Nonetheless, an influential seed had been planted, and when World War II-era general Dwight. D Eisenhower became President in January the next year, an old friend of the British - in particular Prime Minister Winston Churchill and Foreign Minister Antony Eden - was safely ensconced in the Oval Office. 

Offered a significant cut of AIOC’s profits in return for US backing, Eisenhower signed off on a joint CIA/MI6 plan to get Mossadeq. From there on out, the two agencies worked overtime to at last create the revolution-ripe atmosphere in Tehran sought by the British two years earlier. Once the pesky Prime Minister was finally ousted, Shah Pahlavi would reign supreme, and dutifully do the bidding of his patrons in London and Washington. Or so they hoped.

So it was newspapers, radio broadcasts, and the walls of major cities were not only blitzed with anti-Mossadeq propaganda, but also pro-Mossadeq propaganda, purportedly the work of Communists, to paint the Prime Minister as a Red. Religious leaders were attacked and mosques bombed by CIA operatives posing as Mossadeq sympathizers. Meanwhile, Iranian government officials at every level were targeted for kidnap and murder.

Against this chaotic backdrop, seeds of revolution rapidly germinating, Pahlavi angsted that the same forces would in time turn on him too. In May 1953, he told US ambassador to Iran Loy W. Henderson:

“The British threw out the Qajar dynasty; they brought in my father; they threw out my father; and they can throw me out or keep me as they see fit…If the British wish me to go, I should know immediately so that I can quietly leave. Do the British wish to substitute another Shah for me or to abolish the monarchy? Are the British [behind] present efforts to take away my powers and deprive me of my prestige in Iran and abroad?”

This prompted a private intervention from Churchill, who claimed that while the British “do not interfere in Persian politics, we should be very sorry to see the Shah lose his powers or leave his post or be driven out.”

Nonetheless, Pahlavi’s fears about London’s malign meddling stayed with him until his dying day. Not long before being swept from power in  the 1979 Iranian revolution, he declared, “if you lift up Ayatollah Khomeini’s beard, you’ll find ‘Made in England’ written on his chin.”

‘Junior Partner’

The CIA and MI6-orchestrated and financed upheaval in Iran gathered in intensity as August 1953 approached, culminating in a four-day-long series of anti-government protests. Attendees, who only numbered a few thousand, were overwhelmingly directed and funded by British and American spies. At every step, Shah Pahlavi demanded the Prime Minister resign. These directives were consistently ignored, eventually providing a pretext for the Iranian military to storm government buildings, and seize power.

Many Iranians knew the score

While suspicions of British and American involvement simmered ever after, the world was for many decades subsequently convinced Mossadeq’s fall resulted from an organic expression of mass public dissatisfaction. It was not until Iranian revolutionaries occupied the US embassy in Tehran in 1979, seizing sensitive files and documents that hadn’t yet been burned or shredded, reality began to emerge.

So thrilled with the results were British officials, they internally slammed MI6 for not pursuing regime change earlier, and more aggressively. The Iranian caper provided a compelling blueprint, through which their Empire could be maintained via covert means, as its military and financial might, and ability to overtly project force overseas, ever-dwindled. It was a model that would be repeated over and over again not only throughout West Asia, but the entire world, thereafter by British intelligence.

The CIA was likewise energized by its clandestine performance, so commissioned an official internal review of the operation, not intended for public consumption. Authored by career Agency officer Donald Wilber, who led, planned and executed Langley’s contribution to Mossadeq’s overthrow, he attributed the connivance’s success to “active cooperation of the United Kingdom and their assets.”

It is uncertain whether this appraisal was shared with London at the time, but regardless, that finding was gold dust to MI6. Towards the end of World War II, a Foreign Office official remarked that soon, Britain would “be expected to take her place as junior partner in an orbit of power predominantly under American aegis.” Ever since, London’s political, military, intelligence and security apparatus has been overwhelmingly concerned with exploiting and manipulating that aegis for its own ends.

The 1953 Iran coup showed British intelligence precisely how to effectively steer the bigger, richer, more powerful US Empire in directions of its own choosing. For MI6, the past 60 years have been an unending battle to repeat that success.

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