No, the U.S. Didn’t Overthrow a Democratic Government in Persia

Aug. 25 2023

Seventy years ago last Saturday, a popular uprising drove the Iranian prime minister Mohammad Mosaddeq out of office—four days after he had legally been dismissed from his position by the shah. In the West, the event has been remembered as an anti-democratic coup orchestrated by the CIA (whose station chief, Kermit Roosevelt, was all-too-eager to exaggerate his role) to subvert democracy in Persia. Secretary of State Madeleine Albright went so far as to apologize for U.S. involvement in 2000. Shay Khatiri set the record straight in a 2020 essay:

It is true that Mosaddeq’s ascendance to the premiership, on April 28, 1951, was initially democratic. . . . As he was empowered to do, Mosaddeq [thereafter] dissolved the Iranian Senate. Later, he called for a referendum to dissolve the Majlis, or lower house, as well. He had been warned that the assembly would grant Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi the right to replace him. He had made the same point previously in a letter to the shah.

Nevertheless, Mosaddeq went ahead. He believed that the shah did “not have the guts” to replace him. His initiative, under questionable voting circumstances, won with 99 percent of the vote. At that point, Mosaddeq began to rule by decree. The shah, however, did have the guts to replace him—and did so. On August 15, 1953, he issued orders removing Mosaddeq and appointing General Fazlollah Zahedi as prime minister. Nematollah Nassiri, an army colonel, brought a copy of the royal order to Mosaddeq.

Here is where the actual coup took place. Although the shah’s order was legal by his own admission, Mosaddeq refused it, and arrested Nassiri. He then encouraged an uprising by nationalists, Islamists, and Communists against the shah, who left Iran out of concern for his safety.

There followed a popular uprising in support of the Shah. It caught everybody, including the monarch and the U.S. government, by surprise. . . . Following these pro-shah demonstrations, the CIA reconsidered reinstating the monarch. State Department cables show that the U.S. clandestine operation mainly involved directing ongoing protests on the national radio.

Read more at Churchill Project

More about: Iran, Mohammad Mosaddeq, Shah, U.S. Foreign policy

Expand Gaza into Sinai

Feb. 11 2025

Calling the proposal to depopulate Gaza completely (if temporarily) “unworkable,” Peter Berkowitz makes the case for a similar, but more feasible, plan:

The United States along with Saudi Arabia and the UAE should persuade Egypt by means of generous financial inducements to open the sparsely populated ten-to-fifteen miles of Sinai adjacent to Gaza to Palestinians seeking a fresh start and better life. Egypt would not absorb Gazans and make them citizens but rather move Gaza’s border . . . westward into Sinai. Fences would be erected along the new border. The Israel Defense Force would maintain border security on the Gaza-extension side, Egyptian forces on the other. Egypt might lease the land to the Palestinians for 75 years.

The Sinai option does not involve forced transfer of civilian populations, which the international laws of war bar. As the United States, Saudi Arabia, the UAE, and other partners build temporary dwellings and then apartment buildings and towns, they would provide bus service to the Gaza-extension. Palestinian families that choose to make the short trip would receive a key to a new residence and, say, $10,000.

The Sinai option is flawed. . . . Then again, all conventional options for rehabilitating and governing Gaza are terrible.

Read more at RealClear Politics

More about: Donald Trump, Egypt, Gaza Strip, Sinai Peninsula