Iran and the U.S., Part One

The U. S. and Iran have had a tense relationship for decades — but when did that begin? This week, we feature our very first episode about an event from August 1953 — when the CIA helped to overthrow Iran's prime minister. This episode originally ran as Four Days in August https://www.npr.org/2019/07/10/740510559/four-days-in-august. See pcm.adswizz.com https://pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for sponsorship and to manage your podcast sponsorship preferences. NPR Privacy Policy https://www.npr.org/about-npr/179878450/privacy-policy

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

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• 0:18Rund Abdelfatah?

  Hey, it's Rund. We're all watching the current conflict between the United States and Iran. And it got us thinking about the origins of the incredibly complex relationship between these two countries. Today, we're bringing you the very first episode of Throughline, the story of how the US overthrew Iran's democratically-elected prime minister back in 1953. It first ran in 2019, but it's just as relevant today as it was then.

• 0:53Rund Abdelfatah?

  August 15th, 1953.

• 0:58Speaker 02

  Shortly before midnight in Tehran, Iran's capital city, the air was thick with anticipation. Something big was about to happen.

• 1:06Rund Abdelfatah?

  The elected prime minister of Iran, Mohammad Mosaddegh, was sitting at home, waiting. He knew something was coming.

• 1:13Speaker 02

  And he had no idea if he'd still be prime minister by morning.

• 1:16Rund Abdelfatah?

  So with each tick, tick, tick of the clock, he knew that the future of Iran was at stake.

• 1:24Speaker 03

  One truckload of presidential guard soldiers were going to Mosaddegh's house at midnight.

• 1:29Rund Abdelfatah?

  Their mission was simple.

• 1:30Speaker 03

  Go to Mosaddegh's house in the middle of the night.

• 1:32Speaker 02

  Knock on the door.

• 1:33Rund Abdelfatah?

  Tell him he's fired.

• 1:34Speaker 03

  Mosaddegh would then protest undoubtedly and say, "You can't fire me. I'm elected."

• 1:38Speaker 02

  And at that point.

• 1:39Speaker 03

  You would arrest him.

• 1:41Speaker 04

  That failed because Mosaddegh found out about the arrest.

• 1:45Speaker 03

  News of it leaked out.

• 1:48Speaker 04

  Then there was a bit of panic among the army that was supposed to come out and support the arrest of Mosaddegh. The phone lines were supposed to be cut. They were not cut. So there were a number of missteps that took place.

• 2:03Speaker 03

  And when the soldiers arrived at Mosaddegh's house to arrest him, other soldiers jumped out of the woods and arrested those guys.

• 2:11Speaker 02

  Mosaddegh's forces had foiled the coup attempt. He would stay prime minister.

• 2:16Rund Abdelfatah?

  But little did he know, that night was just the beginning of a much bigger battle to come. And it would change the future of Iran and America.

• 2:26Speaker 05

  Iran's British-hating Premier Mossadegh arrived in Cairo. Former Premier Mossadegh's ruined town sees a mute testimony to three days of bloody rioting culminating in a military coup.

• 2:36Speaker 06

  For the first time now, the CIA has released documents that show its role in 1953 coup.

• 2:44Rund Abdelfatah?

  You're listening to Throughline.

• 2:46Speaker 02

  Where we go back in time.

• 2:48Rund Abdelfatah?

  To understand the present.

• 2:59Rund Abdelfatah?

  All right, Ramtin, you were born in Iran and you've spent a bunch of time there. So I'm curious, how much had you heard about this American coup growing up?

• 3:07Speaker 02

  I definitely heard stuff about it, especially from my father, who would remind me all the time, like, "The only reason we're here in the US is because what the US did to our democracy in 1953," right? And I would always just kind of like brush it off, like, "Whatever, that couldn't have happened." It's just like Iranian conspiracy theory stuff, right? But as I grew up, I realized the US actually did interfere in Iran's politics in 1953.

• 3:31Rund Abdelfatah?

  I'm gonna be honest, like, I didn't have much of an idea about this going into the episode. And it's like a really big, shocking thing to not have much of an idea about, because I always thought that 1979 was the real pivotal moment, right? That the Iranian revolution that happened that year and the hostage crisis at the American Embassy, those were the things that really set the tone for like this very tense relationship between the US and Iran.

• 3:56Speaker 02

  Yeah, I mean, that makes sense. Like, why would you or any other American think differently, right? Because 1979 was such an important year. But 1953 is really when it all goes down.

• 4:08Rund Abdelfatah?

  Doesn't it suck that your dad was right?

• 4:12Speaker 02

  Yeah, it really does. It does.

• 4:14Rund Abdelfatah?

  Okay, I want to get into it. It's a great story. So we're gonna take you back to that pivotal moment more than 65 years ago to understand what happened during the coup.

• 4:24Speaker 02

  Why the US made that decision.

• 4:26Rund Abdelfatah?

  And how this event redefined the US-Iran relationship and changed the world.

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• 6:08Rund Abdelfatah?

  August 16th, 1953.

• 6:18Speaker 02

  In the early morning of August 16th, 1953, American agents were hiding out in a safe house at a secret location in Tehran, listening to this song, "Luck Be a Lady Tonight."

• 6:35Speaker 02

  They were waiting to hear whether the coup they had engineered had worked. And the mood was electric, music blasting, booze flowing, everyone celebrating a job well done.

• 6:45Rund Abdelfatah?

  Now, remember, this is 1953, so there were no breaking news alerts, no email, no good way to deliver information fast.

• 6:52Speaker 02

  So as far as these guys knew, the coup had gone off without a hitch.

• 6:56Rund Abdelfatah?

  And there was one guy who was especially happy, Kermit Roosevelt.

• 7:02Speaker 04

  So Kermit Roosevelt was chief of the CIA's nearest in Africa division.

• 7:09Speaker 03

  Like many of the figures in the early CIA, he had been born into privilege, gone to Ivy League schools. His grandfather had been Theodore Roosevelt.

• 7:20Speaker 04

  Distant relative of FDR as well. He was called in to help facilitate this transition.

• 7:28Speaker 03

  So on July 19th, 1953, Kermit Roosevelt crossed over into Iran.

• 7:35Rund Abdelfatah?

  This is Steven Kinzer. He wrote a groundbreaking book on this coup called

• 7:39Speaker 02

  All the Shah's Men and Sanam Vakhi.

• 7:41Rund Abdelfatah?

  Oh, OK, now you can hear me.

• 7:42Speaker 04

  Hello.

• 7:43Rund Abdelfatah?

  She directs the Middle East and North Africa program at Chatham House in London.

• 7:47Speaker 02

  And they were our guides through this story.

• 7:50Rund Abdelfatah?

  OK, so Kermit Roosevelt entered Iran on July 19th with a pretty big mission ahead of him. Stage a coup to get rid of Iran's prime minister, Mohammad Mosaddegh.

• 8:00Speaker 02

  And we'll explain why in a bit.

• 8:02Rund Abdelfatah?

  But the first question Roosevelt had to answer

• 8:04Speaker 03

  I've asked myself this question.

• 8:05Rund Abdelfatah?

  Was how?

• 8:06Speaker 03

  So you're sent into a foreign country and your assignment is overthrow the government. What do you do? Like, what do you do on the first day? 9 o'clock, you get to the office. How do you start?

• 8:18Rund Abdelfatah?

  Even though the CIA had devised a plan for Roosevelt, no one was sure it would actually work. It was suddenly up to Roosevelt to destabilize a whole country.

• 8:30Speaker 02

  Step one.

• 8:30Speaker 03

  Seize control of the Iranian press.

• 8:33Speaker 02

  Basically buy them off with bribes.

• 8:34Speaker 03

  Turned out that the press was quite corrupt.

• 8:37Speaker 02

  And soon enough, Roosevelt had columnists, editors, and reporters from most of Iran's newspapers on his payroll. Then, anti-Mosaddegh propaganda began printing everywhere.

• 8:48Speaker 03

  Mosaddegh was a Jew, a homosexual, a British agent, anything that they thought would outrage people.

• 8:55Speaker 02

  There was such an appetite for these stories that Iranian journalists just couldn't keep up. So Roosevelt had to recruit CIA agents back in Washington to write some of the articles for the Iranian press.

• 9:06Speaker 03

  In fact, one of them later wrote a memoir, and he talked about how bizarre it was. At the CIA, you had the people plotting the Iran coup, and then you had analysts on the other side who weren't aware of the covert action. And he said, "I would write an article about how Mosaddegh was an atheist and he hated God." And then, a couple of days later, A guy from the other side of the hall in the analysis division would run over to my office, holding up an Iranian newspaper and saying, "Wow, you won't believe how the newspapers in Iran are denouncing Mossadegh. Look at this article." And I couldn't tell him I wrote that article.

• 9:44Rund Abdelfatah?

  Step two, recruit allies on the ground. Most importantly, the Islamic clergy, or mullahs, who held a lot of power in Iran.

• 9:52Speaker 03

  Kermit Roosevelt made strategic payments to a number of important mullahs in exchange for them delivering sermons denouncing Mossadegh from the pulpit as against God and irreligious.

• 10:04Speaker 02

  Step three, get Iran's king, the Shah, on board.

• 10:08Speaker 04

  And convince the Iranian Shah, Mohammad Reza Pahlavi, that Mossadegh was a threat.

• 10:14Speaker 02

  This part took some persuading, though.

• 10:16Rund Abdelfatah?

  Yeah, because in theory at least, the Shah and the prime minister were meant to work together.

• 10:21Speaker 02

  But there was a lot of tension between them, because for decades, Iran's parliament and Shah had a tough time sharing power. It would be a big deal for the Shah to help overthrow the prime minister. But Roosevelt saw an opening to turn them against each other.

• 10:34Rund Abdelfatah?

  That included bribing the Shah's sister in exchange for her help convincing the Shah to sign on. And there are reports that a fur coat was even part of the deal. But that tactic failed.

• 10:46Speaker 02

  Eventually, Roosevelt took matters into his own hands and began meeting with the Shah almost every day, at midnight, in a taxicab, always in a different location. During these late-night meetings, Roosevelt managed to convince the Shah that Mossadegh was a threat, and so the Shah agreed to the coup.

• 11:02Rund Abdelfatah?

  And finally, step four, go to Mossadegh's house in the middle of the night, arrest him, and consolidate power in the hands of the Shah, who was more friendly towards the West than Mossadegh.

• 11:13Speaker 02

  But remember, the coup attempt failed.

• 11:16Rund Abdelfatah?

  At this point, you're probably wondering why the US went to all this trouble: sending Roosevelt to Iran, having him stir up chaos in the country, and ultimately, trying to carry out a coup. Why were they so hell-bent on getting Mossadegh out of power?

• 11:29Speaker 02

  Well, the truth is, the US was dragged into the situation by Great Britain, all because of one thing. A fifth of the world's oil supply was cut off. Oil. And nationalist feeling ran high again.

• 11:39Speaker 03

  We sometimes say that countries are blessed with resources. But sometimes, resources can be a curse, particularly if you're a country that's weak, because there are always strong countries that want to come and take what you have.

• 11:54Speaker 02

  And Iran was cursed with a lot of oil. Oil was discovered there in 1908, and almost immediately, Great Britain took an interest. And at that time, Britain was the world's biggest superpower. So they decided to strike a deal with the Iranian Shah, and they needed a lot of oil.

• 12:09Speaker 03

  This deal between the British and Iran was completely one-sided.

• 12:14Speaker 04

  Great Britain was taking well over 80% of the revenues, while Iran was receiving about 10 to 12% of the revenues from its natural resource.

• 12:23Rund Abdelfatah?

  Wait, wait. A deal like that makes no sense, though. Why did Iran agree to that?

• 12:28Speaker 02

  Well, yeah, it makes no sense, unless you're in desperate need of money. And Iran's government in the early 20th century was desperate.

• 12:35Speaker 03

  Iran, during the early part of the 20th century, was still ruled by the old Kajar royal dynasty. This was a very corrupt dynasty, and it supported itself by selling off anything of value in Iran.

• 12:52Speaker 02

  They sold off the transportation industry, the tobacco industry, the caviar fisheries. They even sold off the country's treasury and banking industries. It was basically a free-for-all, and the British were first in line. Oil was by far their most valuable acquisition. And here's a fun fact: The company that controlled all of that oil was originally called the Anglo-Persian Oil Company, which would later become- Every day, BP supplies the fuel and lubricants that start the engines-

• 13:18Rund Abdelfatah?

  Oh, British Petroleum.

• 13:20Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 13:21Rund Abdelfatah?

  So this was obviously very lucrative for them.

• 13:24Speaker 02

  Very lucrative. And during World War I and II, Iranian oil pumped life into the British war effort. So it was absolutely essential to Britain's future.

• 13:33Rund Abdelfatah?

  OK, this all really helps explain the next part of the story, right? Because before he's even prime minister, Mohammad Mosaddegh got to work lobbying against this unfair oil deal, hoping to get a better deal for Iran.

• 13:46Speaker 02

  He tried to negotiate a new deal with the British that would allow Iran to- Keep a bigger share of the profits.

• 13:51Speaker 04

  Which I'm sure freaked out the British.

• 13:52Speaker 02

  And when negotiations broke down, the British imposed a worldwide embargo on Iranian oil. Eventually, in 1951, Mossadegh convinced the Iranian parliament to nationalize Iran's oil. And a month later, he was elected prime minister, which really sent the British to the roof.

• 14:08Speaker 07

  Premier Mossadegh, spearhead of the oil nationalization program, took his case to the United Nations, where he remained adamant in his stand.

• 14:15Speaker 02

  So the British decided that the only solution was to get rid of Mossadegh and put in a more favorable government. And Mossadegh, sensing the British were up to something, shut down their embassy in Iran.

• 14:26Speaker 04

  And here's where I'm assuming the US enters the picture, right?

• 14:29Speaker 02

  Right.

• 14:33Speaker 03

  So they called the Americans for help. And President Truman said, no, you're not going to do it. He actually sent a mediator to Iran. He had Mossadegh come to Washington to try to persuade him. But when nothing worked, he essentially told the British, there's nothing you can do. You're going to have to swallow this. Like, we had to swallow Mexico, nationalizing its oil industry in the 30s. We didn't like it. You're just going to have to live with this.

• 14:57Speaker 02

  But the following year, Dwight Eisenhower became president, and his thinking was a little different.

• 15:02Speaker 03

  Suddenly, you don't have an American president who forbids military action. But on the contrary, you have a new team that's eager to show that it's going to roll back threats to the United States. And that played right into the British hands.

• 15:18Speaker 02

  Plus, this was right around the time when the Cold War was heating up, and Iran happened to share a border with the Soviet Union.

• 15:24Speaker 03

  So what can he do to show that he's fighting communism? Well, he can't bomb Moscow. He's not going to invade China. You can't go after the real enemy. It's not possible. So you have to go after somebody else.

• 15:39Speaker 04

  Iran also, in this period, and I think it's important to mention, there was a Communist Party known as the Tudeh that was active in parliament, was supporting Mossadegh.

• 15:51Speaker 02

  And even though, by all accounts, Mossadegh was not a communist himself, the US was still on high alert. So all these factors.

• 15:59Speaker 03

  A, the British want us to do it.

• 16:01Speaker 02

  Eventually convinced the US.

• 16:02Speaker 03

  B, Mossadegh is threatening the world economic order.

• 16:07Speaker 02

  To get on board with Britain's plan.

• 16:08Speaker 03

  C, we're desperate for a victory.

• 16:11Speaker 02

  To stage a coup and overthrow Iran's prime minister, Mohammad Mossadegh.

• 16:24Rund Abdelfatah?

  At 6 a.m., the morning after the coup attempt, Roosevelt and his men, tired from a night of partying, tuned into the radio. But all they heard was silence.

• 16:36Rund Abdelfatah?

  And Roosevelt knew something had gotten wrong. Then, suddenly,

• 16:41Rund Abdelfatah?

  the radio crackled on. Military music started playing,

• 16:47Rund Abdelfatah?

  and Mosaddegh announced victory over an attempted coup.

• 16:53Rund Abdelfatah?

  He noticed that the Shah was nowhere to be found and immediately suspected that the Shah was behind the coup attempt.

• 17:01Rund Abdelfatah?

  Meanwhile, the Shah knew this might happen, and fearing Mosaddegh would come after him, hopped on his private plane and flew to Baghdad.

• 17:09Speaker 03

  And from there, he went on to Rome, where he told reporters, "I'm probably gonna have to look for work now because I'm obviously never gonna be able to go back to Iran."

• 17:21Rund Abdelfatah?

  So to recap, at the end of day two, the Shah had left Iran, Mosaddegh was still in power with no idea that the US was behind the coup attempt, and Roosevelt had failed. But even though his bosses back in Washington told him he could go home after the coup failed...

• 17:37Speaker 03

  Kermit Roosevelt was not willing to give up that easily. I think it came a little bit from the old CIA can-do mentality. I think he also sensed how weak the Iranian political establishment was. He thought he still had assets that he hadn't used.

• 17:55Rund Abdelfatah?

  Mosaddegh wasn't out of the woods just yet.

• 17:58Speaker 03

  Kermit Roosevelt had not given up and was actually was having a plan B.

• 18:17Speaker 00

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• 19:26Speaker 02

  August 17, 1953.

• 19:33Rund Abdelfatah?

  A couple of days after the failed coup attempt, crowds of supporters packed the streets, chanting the words, "Mosaddegh has won," and "Victory to the nation." It seemed like the worst was behind Mosaddegh. He survived a coup attempt and lived to tell the tale. But this was the calm before the storm. Backroom dealings were happening out of sight, and the threat to Mosaddegh was still very real. And we'll get to that.

• 19:57Speaker 02

  But during this momentary calm, we want to give you some insight into the man who was at the center of this whole thing, the man the US and Britain were terrified of. Mohamed Mosaddegh.

• 20:10Speaker 03

  You get the feeling that this is a kind, fatherly person who cares about the people. And he's very respectful of people. He talks to people with respect, for the first time.

• 20:23Speaker 03

  That an Iranian politician would address him as dear fellow citizen.

• 20:28Speaker 02

  This is Dr. Ibrahim Noruzi.

• 20:30Speaker 03

  I'm a retired physician.

• 20:31Speaker 02

  Dr. Noruzi was born in 1942 in a town in Iran called Qazvin. And he's a Mossadegh superfan. He even created a website to honor him. Dr. Noruzi became very interested in politics from a young age.

• 20:44Speaker 03

  I have no idea exactly why because we didn't even have radio in our house when I was a kid, when I was in elementary school. Maybe I was very tiny and I was bullied a lot. Maybe so I wanted some sort of justice in the world.

• 20:58Speaker 02

  Dr. Noruzi, like a lot of Iranians, sees Mossadegh as kind of a national hero, a sort of Gandhi for Iran. He's really become a mythical figure. But to really understand Mossadegh, we have to find the man behind the myth.

• 21:15Speaker 03

  So Mohammed Mossadegh was an Iranian aristocrat.

• 21:19Speaker 04

  Again, Stephen Kinzer.

• 21:20Speaker 03

  His father had been finance minister for decades under the Kajah regime. His mother was a princess.

• 21:26Speaker 04

  He held various positions. That's Nenbakhil, Minister of Foreign Affairs, Minister of Finance, elected twice to the Iranian parliament.

• 21:35Speaker 03

  He went off to be educated in Europe. He came home and began campaigning against the agreement by which the British were trying to subjugate Iran

• 21:49Speaker 03

  and became quite outraged at the injustices he saw around him.

• 21:54Speaker 04

  And Mossadegh was known to be very dramatic.

• 21:58Speaker 04

  There are these anecdotes where he used to receive visitors in his bed in his pajamas, for example.

• 22:06Rund Abdelfatah?

  Mossadegh was a pretty eccentric guy, prone to outbursts and dramatic speeches where he would cry, even pass out. And the US and Britain saw him as kind of erratic and unreliable, difficult to negotiate with, even if he was a fan of democratic ideas.

• 22:21Speaker 04

  Very much believed in the democratic ideals on checks and balances that were necessary to curtail monarchical power at the time. And he came of age during a time where these changes also influenced the political system.

• 22:36Rund Abdelfatah?

  The biggest political change you witnessed happened when Mosaddegh was in his 20s. Between 1905 and 1911, Iran went through a constitutional revolution.

• 22:46Speaker 03

  This was a remarkable moment in Middle Eastern history and in the history of the developing world. Iran developed a constitution in 1906. There are countries in the Middle East that don't even have a constitution today.

• 22:58Rund Abdelfatah?

  The revolution sought to make Iran more democratic, with things like a parliament, a constitution, and a free press.

• 23:03Speaker 02

  See, for centuries, the country had been ruled by shahs or kings, with power passing from fathers to sons. But by the turn of the 20th century...

• 23:11Rund Abdelfatah?

  By the turn of the 20th century, the corrupt, irresponsible business dealings of the shahs were driving the Iranian economy straight into the ground, which made the shahs really unpopular among the people.

• 23:21Speaker 02

  And this wasn't like normal corruption. We're talking crazy excessive spending.

• 23:25Rund Abdelfatah?

  Yeah, like one shah had a harem of 1,600 people.

• 23:28Speaker 02

  1,600?

• 23:29Rund Abdelfatah?

  1,600. And he and his many, many sons would use the national treasury as their personal piggy bank, taking money out whenever, you know, they wanted to travel around Europe.

• 23:39Speaker 02

  He also demanded that people call him one of the following names:

• 23:42Speaker 06

  Shahen Shah.

• 23:43Speaker 02

  Shah of Shahs.

• 23:44Speaker 06

  Aria Mez.

• 23:45Speaker 02

  Asylum of the Universe.

• 23:46Speaker 06

  Buzur Artishtaran.

• 23:48Speaker 02

  Subduer of Climate.

• 23:51Speaker 02

  Guardian of the flock.

• 23:54Speaker 02

  Or Shadow of God on Earth.

• 23:57Rund Abdelfatah?

  I could see wanting to be called Guardian of the Flock. Or would you prefer Shadow of God on Earth?

• 24:03Speaker 02

  I personally like Subduer of Climate.

• 24:06Rund Abdelfatah?

  What does that even mean?

• 24:07Speaker 02

  I don't know, but it just feels like a very...

• 24:08Rund Abdelfatah?

  We need a Subduer of Climate right now.

• 24:09Speaker 02

  Actually, we do need one right now. You're right.

• 24:12Rund Abdelfatah?

  Anyway, point is, the shahs were out of control. And the constitutional revolution united people across Iran against the shah in favor of a more representative government.

• 24:21Speaker 04

  A coalition, if you will, of intellectuals, people from the bazaar, the clergy.

• 24:27Speaker 02

  When that coalition stood up to the monarchy, violence broke out.

• 24:30Rund Abdelfatah?

  And one of the most interesting stories that I came across, Ramtin, that I don't think I've told you about yet, was the story of this American guy who actually fought in Iran's constitutional revolution.

• 24:40Speaker 02

  What? Really?

• 24:41Rund Abdelfatah?

  Yeah. His name was...

• 24:43Speaker 03

  Howard Baskerville.

• 24:44Rund Abdelfatah?

  Howard Baskerville.

• 24:45Speaker 03

  Who was it? Graduate of Princeton University Seminary School.

• 24:49Speaker 04

  Baskerville was an American missionary. And in this period, there was a lot of missionary activity coming from the United States. They would support education in various countries throughout the Middle East.

• 25:01Speaker 03

  He came to Iran and he identified with their plight. And Baskerville wanted to go and fight.

• 25:07Rund Abdelfatah?

  On the side of the constitutionalists?

• 25:09Speaker 03

  Exactly.

• 25:10Rund Abdelfatah?

  But the US representative in Iran begged Baskerville not to join the fight.

• 25:14Speaker 03

  He came to him and yelled at him, no, you can't do that, you know? You shouldn't get involved in civil war of other countries. You came here to help, you know? But he wouldn't listen. And then he threatened him that if you go and involve yourself in the war, I take away your passport. He said, OK, this is my passport. He threw it at him. He said, no, just because I was born in America, that doesn't mean I'm better than them. I'm like them. I'm gonna fight for them, for their cause, and this is a good cause. Unfortunately, he dies just the first hour of a battle. And by the way, Baskerville, his sculpture was installed in Constitutional Hall in Tavris.

• 25:57Speaker 03

  And his tomb is like a worship place. So Iranian extrapolated these missionaries' action to America as a government. So what I'm saying is that Americans left a very good impression in Iran. Iranians loved it.

• 26:15Rund Abdelfatah?

  I had never heard of this guy, Howard Baskerville.

• 26:18Speaker 02

  Neither had I before this. I mean, it's really wild to think that this guy would have laid down his life for Iran's constitutional revolution. Like, think about it. How many Americans at that time even knew where Iran was, let alone go over there and fight?

• 26:32Rund Abdelfatah?

  Right. And it's interesting because at that time, Britain and the Shah were the bad guys, but America was kind of an ally in their fight.

• 26:40Speaker 02

  Yeah, exactly, until they got involved.

• 26:45Speaker 02

  In the days after the coup attempt, however, all that seemed to matter was that Mossadegh was a man of the people and that he was still in power. But out of sight, a new plot against Mossadegh was brewing.

• 26:57Rund Abdelfatah?

  Kermit Roosevelt's Plan B.

• 27:20Speaker 07

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• 27:43Speaker 03

  And I'm Casey Newton.

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• 27:55Speaker 03

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• 28:01Speaker 07

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• 28:06Speaker 03

  On the latest episode of Sources and Methods, in Israel this week, an election with no clear winner. Next week, in the US, an election that could shift the balance of power in Washington. And in both countries, a defining issue for voters: the war in Iran. We look at where things could be headed in that conflict. Listen this week to Sources and Methods, the national security podcast from NPR.

• 28:40Speaker 02

  August 19th.

• 28:42Rund Abdelfatah?

  1953.

• 28:43Speaker 02

  Attention is focused once again on the Middle East, where events in Iran have taken a dramatic double twist. During the three days after the Shah fled and Roosevelt's coup attempt failed.

• 28:52Rund Abdelfatah?

  Roosevelt set the stage for his second coup attempt. And on August 19th, it began.

• 28:58Speaker 02

  Hundreds and hundreds of rioters filled the streets of Tehran. And in a word, it was chaos.

• 29:06Speaker 03

  And his plan was this. First of all, hire gangs of Iranians through people who controlled criminal protection rackets and pay them to go out on the street and cause chaos.

• 29:23Rund Abdelfatah?

  So Roosevelt actually paid criminals and gang members to storm into the city.

• 29:28Speaker 02

  Beat up people in the streets.

• 29:29Rund Abdelfatah?

  Break shop windows.

• 29:30Speaker 03

  Shoot your guns into mosques.

• 29:32Rund Abdelfatah?

  And while doing all that yell.

• 29:33Speaker 03

  We love Mosaddegh. We love communism.

• 29:36Speaker 02

  And then?

• 29:37Speaker 03

  He hired a second mob to attack the first mob.

• 29:41Speaker 02

  Which led to bloody violent clashes between the two mobs.

• 29:46Rund Abdelfatah?

  And the really trippy thing was that everybody involved.

• 29:48Speaker 03

  Everybody involved in the battles was being paid to be there. But what they didn't know was they were being paid by the same source.

• 29:55Speaker 02

  The CIA. And all of this was designed to create confusion and to signal that Mosaddegh was the source of the violence in the country, that he was losing control, which was becoming more and more true.

• 30:06Speaker 03

  Mosaddegh refused to send the police out because he said, well, they're peaceful demonstrators. People should be allowed to say what they want. He truly was too naive to grasp what was happening.

• 30:17Rund Abdelfatah?

  And this brings us to the final part of Roosevelt's plan, to get rid of Mosaddegh once and for all. Roosevelt ordered both mobs to head to Mosaddegh's house.

• 30:27Speaker 03

  So a giant crowd surrounded Mosaddegh's house.

• 30:30Rund Abdelfatah?

  Shouting insults and throwing stones.

• 30:32Speaker 03

  Then who should show up but several police and military commanders, including a couple with tanks, people who Kermit Roosevelt had bribed to participate.

• 30:44Rund Abdelfatah?

  Those officers began opening fire on Mosaddegh's house while inside, Mosaddegh and a few of his closest advisers huddled together.

• 30:52Speaker 03

  Tells them, I want to die here in the house.

• 30:56Speaker 03

  But somehow they managed to drag him out a back window. They got him over a fence. He fled. The house was looted. And immediately thereafter, Kermit Roosevelt went to get his savior general, who he'd been hiding in a safe house, brought the guy to a radio station, and the guy proclaimed himself as a new leader of Iran.

• 31:18Speaker 02

  So this guy, General Zahidi, was put in power as a placeholder until the Shah, who, remember, had fled to Rome, could return. Mossadegh eventually turned himself in. And just like that, with a couple of chess moves, Kermit Roosevelt's plan ushered Iran into a new era.

• 31:40Speaker 05

  The Shah, who had fled to Rome, comes home, backed by General Zahidi, military strongman, who engineered his return to power.

• 31:47Speaker 02

  Everything Mossadegh was, the Shah was not.

• 31:50Rund Abdelfatah?

  Which isn't really surprising, given the corruption of the Shahs.

• 31:54Speaker 02

  The Shah then ruled over Iran like a dictator for 25 years. And the Western powers, including the US, didn't really care because he gave them easy access to Iran's oil.

• 32:04Rund Abdelfatah?

  During that time, the Shah did everything in his power to get rid of any trace of the Mossadegh era.

• 32:10Speaker 02

  Mossadegh's name was banned. Again, Dr. Noor Uzi. You don't hear anything about Mossadegh after the coup. And that was the time I was actually in high school. I don't remember anything, you know, much. Mossadegh, the coup, they were off limits. Things that the Iranian government wanted people to forget.

• 32:28Rund Abdelfatah?

  Under these conditions, Mossadegh became a sort of legend, a symbol of Iran's lost potential.

• 32:34Speaker 02

  The CIA only officially acknowledged its role in the coup in 2013, 60 years later.

• 32:41Rund Abdelfatah?

  In case you're wondering what happened to Mossadegh...

• 32:43Speaker 03

  So he turned himself in.

• 32:45Speaker 05

  In the quick shift of power, Mossadegh was finally apprehended and awaits trial.

• 32:49Speaker 03

  And was placed on trial. He was convicted of treason and sentenced to a prison term, followed by life under house arrest. A couple of his closest advisers were executed. There were hundreds of other executions of people who were suspected to be disloyal in the military. And Mossadegh remained almost a taboo figure, almost for the rest of his life.

• 33:13Rund Abdelfatah?

  As for Kermit Roosevelt?

• 33:14Speaker 03

  Kermit Roosevelt stayed in Tehran to wait for the Shah to come back from Rome and then arranged a farewell meeting with the Shah before leaving Iran. The Shah greeted him with a toast. And he said, "I owe my throne to God, my people, and you." He was right, although it might not be the right order. So Kermit Roosevelt went home and of course, he was welcomed jubilantly back in Washington as a kind of a conquering hero. He went on to more years at the CIA, then later left, became an oil consultant.

• 33:55Rund Abdelfatah?

  Oh, and speaking of oil, the holy grail of resources that started this whole thing, as you might expect, Iranians still ended up with a pretty bad deal after the coup was said and done.

• 34:06Speaker 05

  Iranian oil may again flow westward.

• 34:16Speaker 02

  Okay, so given all this.

• 34:17Speaker 05

  Fundamentalism took hold with a fury.

• 34:19Speaker 02

  Resentment built up against the Shah.

• 34:21Speaker 05

  The Shah declared martial law in most of Iran's cities.

• 34:24Speaker 02

  And in 1979, Iranians reached a breaking point and revolted against the Shah.

• 34:30Speaker 05

  The crowd shouted, "Death to the Shah."

• 34:32Speaker 02

  The Shah fled Iran, and the clergy assumed control of the country. That same year, a hostage crisis unfolded at the American Embassy.

• 34:44Speaker 05

  CBS News. Young Iranians described as students acting with the blessing of Ayatollah Khomeini have occupied the American Embassy in Tehran.

• 34:52Speaker 03

  After 30 days of unsuccessfully trying to get the American hostages out of Tehran, the government of the United States is now trying to get the deposed Shah of Iran out of this country. And there is no sign tonight that either problem is likely to be solved soon.

• 35:06Rund Abdelfatah?

  In 1979, the 1953 coup was invoked as justification for seizing the American Embassy. The argument was at the time that these diplomats, these American diplomats inside the embassy, were about to do what Americans had done in Iran, overthrowing Mossadegh and restoring the Shah, and they were about to do the same thing. And therefore, they justified to the public why they needed to shut the embassy down. This is Roya Hakakian. She writes a lot about this time in Iran's history, and the subject is deeply personal for her. As someone who was born and raised in Iran during the The tumultuous years of the Iranian revolution and its aftermath.

• 35:51Rund Abdelfatah?

  And Roya challenged everything we thought we knew about this story. Because up until now, we thought the basic story was this. Pre-1953, US and Iran are pretty chill. Britain is the bad guy. 1953 coup happens. The US installs a dictator in Iran. And eventually, the people respond with a revolution and hostage crisis. And the US and Iran become mortal enemies. So that is the narrative that was presented at the time. It was wrong for the US to intervene. But at the same time, this isn't the whole story. And it tells only a very small part of why Iran has been stuck in this place for so long.

• 36:35Rund Abdelfatah?

  Roya says that narrative lets one group off the hook way too easily. Iran's clergy. A piece that's missing from the way this narrative has been told is the fact that Kermit Roosevelt decides, very wisely, obviously, to go pay a visit to the Grand Ayatollah Behaani in Tehran. And, you know, history changes course after he does that. So remember when Roosevelt got help from the mullahs to carry out his Plan B after that first coup attempt failed? Well, Roya thinks that moment was the real game changer. She says Iran's clergy has been conspiring behind the scenes for a long time to oppose democracy in Iran.

• 37:16Speaker 02

  She says they saw a chance to undermine democracy in 1953. And then in 1979, when it seemed like democracy would be the result of the revolution, they saw another opportunity to take power. And they did this all while invoking Mossadegh's name.

• 37:31Rund Abdelfatah?

  Yes, yes. It's really, truly ironic because by 1979, Mossadegh is long dead. But his legacy is not. So while he himself was completely axed by the clerical...

• 37:45Rund Abdelfatah?

  Powers at the time, his narrative, his legacy, became very useful to the regime. In other words, it's a mistake to put all the blame for Iran's problems on the US intervention in 1953, that the Iranian clergy have played a part, too.

• 38:02Speaker 02

  I hear what Roya is saying. Iran's mullahs have definitely done a number on their country, and there's plenty of blame to go around between the US and Iran, especially since 1979.

• 38:14Rund Abdelfatah?

  There's a long list of back and forth grievances that have added to and fueled the tension.

• 38:21Speaker 02

  But you can still make the argument that the original sin of the US-Iran relationship was what happened in August 1953.

• 38:31Rund Abdelfatah?

  And that that set the tone for everything to follow.

• 38:36Speaker 03

  In the United States, US-Iran relations begin and end with the hostage crisis. That's the moment that is the key turning point and the source of everything. From the Iranian perspective, things are very different. Iranian and American perceptions, they're like parallel train tracks that just keep running parallel. They never coincide.

• 39:16Speaker 02

  That's it for our first episode. I'm Ramtin Arablouei.

• 39:19Rund Abdelfatah?

  I'm Randa Abdel Fattah.

• 39:21Speaker 02

  And you've been listening to Throughline.

• 39:22Rund Abdelfatah?

  Our show was produced by me and Ramtin.

• 39:24Speaker 02

  Our team includes. Jamie York. Jordana Hoekman.

• 39:27Speaker 00

  Lawrence Wu. Yo, yo, it's. Michelle Lance.

• 39:30Speaker 06

  Nigel Eaton.

• 39:32Speaker 02

  Thank you also to Larry Kaplow for his editing help and Greta Pittinger for her help backtracking.

• 39:37Rund Abdelfatah?

  Our music was composed by Drop Electric.

• 39:39Speaker 02

  And special thanks to Anya Grunman.

• 39:41Rund Abdelfatah?

  Chris Turpin.

• 39:42Speaker 02

  Matil Piard.

• 39:43Rund Abdelfatah?

  And Steve Nelson.

• 39:44Speaker 02

  For working so hard to make this show a reality.

• 39:46Rund Abdelfatah?

  And Nada Arablouei, Ramtin's dad, who helped us out with some translations.

• 39:51Speaker 02

  And let's keep the conversation going. If you have an idea or thoughts on the episode, send us an email to [email protected].

• 39:59Rund Abdelfatah?

  Thanks for listening.

• 40:10Speaker 07

  Stay tuned for the following announcements and messages from our sponsors.