----- Original Message ----- From: Rick Rozoff <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Sent: Sunday, April 16, 2000 11:09 AM Subject: [STOPNATO] CIA/MI6 Role In 1953 Iranian Coup Revealed STOP NATO: NO PASARAN! - HTTP://WWW.STOPNATO.HOME-PAGE.ORG N.Y. Times Details CIA's Role in 1953 Iranian Coup NEW YORK (Reuters) - A secret CIA document shows that the U.S. intelligence agency ``stumbled into success�� in its covert 1953 operation to oust an ultra-nationalist Iranian prime minister and bolster a ``vacillating�� young shah, The New York Times reported on Sunday. The newspaper called the still-classified history the first detailed U.S. government account of the coup to be made public. The events of 1953 consolidated the power of the shah, whose authoritarian, U.S.-supported rule lasted 26 years, until he was deposed in a militantly Islamic -- and anti-American -- revolution. The Times said in a multipart article in its Sunday edition that the government report, ``written by the CIA�s chief coup planner,�� showed that the 1953 operation�s success ``was mostly a matter of chance�� and that the CIA ``had almost complete contempt for the man it was empowering, Shah Mohammed Reza Pahlavi, whom it derided as a vacillating coward.�� Speak your mindDiscuss this story with other people. [Start a Conversation] (Requires Yahoo! Messenger) In the end, the agency ``stumbled into success despite a series of mishaps that derailed its original plans,�� the paper noted. The complete government document was posted on the Times' Web site, http://www.nytimes.com. The newspaper said the study of the CIA's first successful overthrow of a foreign government had been provided by a former official who kept a copy. It was written in 1954 by Donald N. Wilber, described as a ``gentleman spy�� and expert in Persian architecture who died three years ago at 89. British Role Pivotal The Times said the document showed the pivotal role that British intelligence played in planning the coup against Iran's Prime Minister Mohammed Mossadegh, who sought to nationalize the Anglo-Iranian Oil Co. The CIA operation, code-named TP-Ajax, was designed to maintain the West's control over Iranian oil. But the agency found the shah ``a reluctant warrior�� when it came to issuing royal decrees dismissing Mossadegh and replacing him with the more tractable Gen. Fazlollah Zahedi, the Times said. ``The history says agency officers ... worked directly with royalist Iranian military officers, handpicked the prime minister�s replacement, sent a stream of envoys to bolster the shah�s courage, directed a campaign of bombings by Iranians posing as members of the Communist Party, and planted articles and editorial cartoons in newspapers,�� the newspaper reported. But ``almost nothing went according to the meticulously drawn plans�� on Aug. 15, 1953, the Times said. Mossadegh had advance warning of the plot, Zahedi went into hiding, and the shah fled to Baghdad. It was only when several Tehran newspapers published the shah's decrees four days later that popular support permitted the successful mounting of a second coup. Two days after that, CIA officials moved $5 million into Iran to help consolidate the government they had put into power, the Times quotes the secret history as saying. ______________________________________________________________________ To unsubscribe, write to [EMAIL PROTECTED] Start Your Own FREE Email List at http://www.listbot.com/links/joinlb
