Iran's Communist Tudeh Party example essay topic

What was the motivation behind US policy with respect to the government-sanctioned overthrow of the democratically-elected government of Iran in 1953? On August 19, 1953, the United States sanctioned its first, peacetime use of covert action to overthrow the constitutional government of a sovereign nation, successfully orchestrating the overthrow of Iran's popular Prime Minister, Mohammed Mossadegh, and restoring the Shah to his throne. The question is -- why? Thesis This paper will argue that the Marxist framework of international relations -- namely that economic interest determines politics and political structure, and that the goal of economic (and political) activity is the redistribution of wealth and power -- provides the most effective explanation as to the driving force behind the US government's fateful decision. The paper will reconstruct the information available to the Eisenhower administration up to the planning and execution of Operation Ajax, as the coup came to be called by the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), so as to ascertain the key elements that would have factored into the government's foreign policy decision-making process prior to the event.

It will then illustrate the aptness of Marxist theory, first, of its own accord, as well as through offering a comparative analysis of an alternative Realist theory. Finally, the paper will conclude by distinguishing between the US government's motivation versus its justification for the coup, thereby demonstrating not only why but also how this particular foreign policy decision was undertaken. Two prevailing theories have been posited to explain the rationale behind the US government's decision to topple the Iranian government in 1953. The first is a Realist notion, a key proposition of which is the balancing of power between states. This argument proposes that US decision makers concluded that the regime of Mohammad Mossadegh posed a sufficient threat to US national interests to merit overthrow. This explanation claims that, given the Cold War fears prevalent at the time, that the United States suspected Mossadegh of having Communist sympathies and saw him as becoming increasingly alienated from the West and more closely allied with Iran's Soviet-dominated Tudeh Party, and so feared Iran would likely fall within the Communist orbit.

Therefore, Realism, saw international anarchy as having fostered competition and conflict among states, and states as having had survival as their core interest. Thus, the Realist explanation positions the US-backed coup of Iran as essentially a struggle for power between the Cold War superpowers of the United States and the Soviet Union, played out on Iranian soil. The second theory is the Marxist belief, which says that Mossadegh's real "crime", in the eyes of US officials, had been to nationalize Iran's oil industry. Marxists say the political motives at work can only be expressed in terms of the economic, given that every conflict is one of power and power depends on resources. This explanation claims that what was, in fact, threatened was not Iran's ideological sovereignty but the huge, potential profits of foreign oil companies which were, given Mossadegh's nationalization scheme, excluded from operating in Iran's vast oilfields. Marxists contend that in pursuit of wealth and power, nations, whether capitalist, socialist, or fascist, contend over the territorial division and exploitation of the globe.

Therefore, US policymakers were driven by the desire to ensure that US oil companies would gain a share in Iran's lucrative oil production. Mohammad Mossadegh Since both theories rest heavily on the US' assessment of the Iranian Prime Minister and the decisions he was or was not likely to take -- whether as a potential Communist sympathizer or as an economically-savvy, and therefore menacing developing country leader -- it is important to establish who Mohammad Mossadegh was and how he was perceived by the United States. Mossadegh was a lawyer and wealthy landowner who had been a prominent political figure in Iran since the early 1900's. In his long years in public service, Mossadegh had gained a reputation as a liberal democrat and an ardent nationalist.

A New York Times article, published in 1952, noted that "prevailing opinion among detached observers in Tehran [is that] Mossadegh is the most popular politician in the country". By the late 1940's, he had identified himself with two main issues: a desire to transfer political power from the royal court to the parliament, and a desire to increase Iran's control over its oil industry, which was then controlled by the British-owned Anglo-Iranian Oil Company (AIOC). These two issues eclipsed all others in 1949, when a new oil agreement favorable to the AIOC, which was made possible by the refusal of Mohammad Reza Pahlavi, the Shah of Iran, to renegotiate or nationalize the A OIC concession, was announced and when the Shah tried to rig the 16th Majlis (parliamentary) elections. These actions enraged the opposition.

Large demonstrations ensued and an organized known as the National Front was formed to coordinate opposition to the Shah and to the British. Mossadegh soon emerged as its de facto leader... In March 1951, Mossadegh submitted a bill calling for nationalization of the oil industry to the Majlis, which was passed by a unanimous vote in the Iranian parliament and was supported by the overwhelming majority of the Iranian people, for reasons of both economic justice and national pride. A month later, the Shah, yielding to a rising tide of popular pressure, appointed Mossadegh to be Prime Minister on April 29, 1951. Two days later, and immediately after taking office, Mossadegh signed the nationalization bill into law.

The nationalization law quickly brought Mossadegh into direct conflict with the British government, which owned 50 percent of the AIOC's stock. The Mossadegh government attempted to placate the British, first by offering to set aside 25 percent of the net profits of the oil operation as compensation, then by guaranteeing the safety and jobs of the British employees, and finally by offering to sell its oil without disturbance to the control system, which was valued highly by the international oil giants. However, the British would accept nothing short of the 50-50 profit sharing arrangement they had enjoyed prior to the nationalization law. In retaliation, the British adopted a three-track strategy designed to reestablish their control over Iran's oil. First the British pressured Mossadegh through direct negotiations. Unsatisfied, they appealed to the International Court, the United Nations, and the United States for intervention.

When that did not produce the desired results, the British navy commenced military maneuvers in the region, which were accompanied by the imposition of economic sanctions on Iran, a British-led international boycott, and a freezing of Iranian assets -- all of which combined to bring Iran's oil exports and foreign trade to a virtual standstill and plunged the already impoverished country to near destitution. Finally, without having achieved their intended objective, the British opted to remove Mossadegh from office altogether. Hearing of a cabal to oust him, and suspecting British involvement, Mossadegh expelled the remaining British workers from Iran's oilfields on September 20, 1951, prompting the British to make plans to invade Iran at Abadan. US President Harry S. Truman opposed an invasion and instead recommended negotiations. The lack of US support, and Truman's personal intervention, were largely responsible for causing the British to abandon their attempt to overthrow Mossadegh at this time.

Realism: Assertions and Analysis Was the 1953 coup d'etat in Iran a Realist power struggle between the Cold War superpowers, played out on Iranian soil? Was the chief, motivating concern of both parties, in fact, driven by external security? The Cold War was at its height in the early 1950's, and the Soviet Union was viewed as an expansionist power seeking world domination. The USSR exploded the atomic bomb in September of 1949, leading to a vast American military buildup between 1950-1953, triggering a Soviet counter-buildup. President Harry S. Truman and his advisers came to view Stalin's regime as brutal, relentlessly expansionist, and bent on the destruction of Western capitalism.

The Kremlin, in turn, charged the United States with capitalist imperialism and accused the Truman administration of trying to encircle the Soviet Union. President Dwight D. Eisenhower had made the Soviet Threat a key issue in the 1952 elections, accusing the Democrats of being soft on communism and of having "lost China". Unsurprisingly, Iran, which shares a border more than 1,000 miles long with the Soviet Union, was soon under the spotlight. The perceived threat of the Tudeh Party of Iran (Iran's version of pro-Soviet Communist Party) and the possibility of Iran going to the Communist camp was the Realist rationale behind the coup. Established in 1941, the Tudeh grew to become a popular political organization by the late 1940's. According to a CIA estimate in 1952, the Party had 20,000 hard-core members, 8,000 of whom were in Tehran.

Estimates on the number of officers involved in the Military Organization varied from 466 to 700. So what was the perceived possibility that the Tudeh Party might have overthrown Mossadegh in a coup or through gradual infiltration and subversion of the government? The Party was illegal at that time, therefore it was forced to operate clandestinely. Most Iranians were extremely wary of the Tudeh, and Mossadegh had taken strong measures against the Party as late as August 18, 1953. The Tudeh was still much weaker than it had been at the height of its peak in 1946. Factional infighting had been part of the Tudeh existence since its inception.

In addition, the Tudeh had no representatives in the Mossadegh government. The CIA had, by this time, penetrated the Tudeh at a very high level, so the Agency would have had considerable insight into the Party's level of power and plans. However, the Tudeh was depicted by the CIA as an agent of international Communism, ready to deliver Iran to the Soviet camp. An alarming situation was presented to the American and British public: that Iran's Communist Tudeh Party was about to take over a strategic country bordering the Soviet Cold War foe, and that Mossadegh's moves were a threat to Western oil access.

However, in fact, all oil-exporting countries, even Communist ones, were eager to sell oil to the West, which was their most important market. While there were many "demonstrations" occurring in the lead-up to the coup, it is important to note that most were largely "fake", having been orchestrated and financed by the CIA in an effort to undermine Mossadegh. Furthermore, the US embassy was deliberately overstating both the strength of the Tudeh and the degree to which Mossadegh was cooperating with the Party in its public statements in this period. Therefore, while it is true that Mossadegh's support base was eroding considerably -- especially in the months just prior to the coup -- it is important to question whether such instability would have resulted without the intervention of outside forces, namely British and American intelligence officers.

Furthermore, Mossadegh's position was not as precarious as the intelligence agencies were making out. As for the Iranian economic situation, it had been described by US analysts as "desperate" in late 1951, thanks largely to the British having plotted against Mossadegh almost continuously since September of that year, backing three major, protracted efforts to oust him. As mentioned earlier, Britain had also instituted an oil embargo and a variety of other economic sanctions against Iran. However, stimulative fiscal policies begun in the summer of 1952 had produced a modest recovery by the end of the year. Efforts were made to sell oil to countries such as Japan and Italy in early 1953. Business was described as "brisk" in May 1953 by the US commercial attach'e in Tehran, and both agriculture and non-oil exports were reported to be doing well.

Initially, it is perhaps arguable that the British, having failed to secure President Truman's and therefore US backing of the plot on the basis of Britain's economic concerns, knowingly capitalized on American sensitivity to the Communist threat at that time, and fed into American fears by embellishing accounts of the Soviet influence in Iran as a means of securing US backing of the coup. In fact, it was imperative for the British to secure US backing, because on October 16, 1952, Mossadegh would break diplomatic relations with Britain, after having discovered another British plot -- this time to conspire with a group of Iranian military officers, including arms and MI 6 assistance, to overthrow the Prime Minister. Lacking a base for operations inside Iran, the British henceforth would be forced to rely on the United States to deal with Mossadegh. However, US involvement in Iran had increased considerably by early 1951.

In 1950 the gradual reemergence of the Tudeh, growing unrest caused by the oil dispute, and a severe recession within Iran, caused primarily by ongoing British intervention, led US policymakers to become increasingly concerned about Iran. Realists say this concern was over Iran's susceptibility to Soviet takeover. That concern prompted the US to sign a $23 million per year military aid agreement. A $25 million Export-Import Bank loan was also approved, and a $10 million International Bank loan request was supported. The CIA and embassy staffs in Tehran were also increased.

Therefore, given the US' increased staffing and multi-million-dollar aid packages, there was sufficient time -- two and a half years -- and financial resources committed to Iran prior to the actual execution of the plot for the US to have compiled its own intelligence, which would have indicated serious doubts as to the existence and / or seriousness of a Soviet threat. Iran was not of great concern to US policymakers in the late 1940's. For one thing, the Tudeh Party had been seriously weakened in the 1945-46 Azerbaijan crisis and Iran was relatively stable. For another, Anglo-US military strategy called for Britain rather than the United States to defend Iran in the event of a Soviet invasion. Even still, the CIA, under the Truman administration, commenced Operation BEDAMN in 1948 to counter Soviet and Tudeh influence in Iran.

BEDAMN was a propaganda and political action program, funded at $1 million per year. CIA participants have described this as "an orchestrated program of destabilization" and "an all-out effort". There were numerous incidents of widespread unrest and demonstrations -- almost all of which were fomented by British or American intelligence officers operating in Iran at the time -- however which Mossadegh consistently managed to contain and control, with the help of loyal army units. The Tudeh had, in fact, been very active in some of the riots, leading Mossadegh to order a wave of arrests. Despite the Party's increased visibility, however, the Tudeh apparently did not gain in strength during this period.

So, if the Tudeh did not pose a sufficient threat from within Iran, what about the threat of Communism from the Soviet Union itself? After an attempt on the Shah's life in February 1949, many Tudeh leaders had to flee the country in order to avoid arrest, while many others were arrested. This development split the Tudeh leadership into two groups -- namely those who were abroad and those who resided inside the country. There was no strong, systematic contact between the groups until, ironically, after the coup. Furthermore, the 1953 coup occurred at a time when the Soviet Union was going through profound internal change. Soviet dictator Joseph Stalin died in March 1953, leaving a power vacuum in the Kremlin's leadership.

Stalin's death also unleashed a wave of unrest in Eastern Europe, as some Soviet satellites tested the limits of Moscow's tolerance. This was the beginning of de-Salinization of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union (CPSU). During this period, the CPSU was engaged in a struggle for consolidation of power between two groups. This struggle forced the Soviet leadership to spend more time and energy on its domestic affairs and less on international issues. Again, given the high levels of CIA penetration in the Communist Tudeh Party, this information would have been well known. Furthermore, from the vantage point of a Realist, the Soviet Threat would have qualified as being effectively "contained".

However, even if we assume that the Eisenhower administration was, in fact, truly fearful of a Communist takeover in Iran, and therefore we view Operation Ajax as one more step in its global effort to block Soviet expansionism, it must be pointed out that there were many other less extreme strategies that could have been pursued, short of a full-scale coup, and still have achieved Realist objectives. For one thing, most middle level State Department and CIA officials did not believe that a coup was necessary to avert a Communist takeover. Neither Henry Byroad e, the Assistant Secretary of State with responsibility for the Middle East, nor the US Ambassador to Iran, Loy Henderson, favored a coup in early 1953. Iran specialists in the CIA and the CIA station chief in Tehran were also opposed to a coup. Furthermore, CIA analysts did not regard Mossadegh as a Communist, and the Tudeh Party was not believed to be capable of seizing power at this time.

Moreover, the Iranian economy had become relatively stable by this time, so a general collapse was not viewed as imminent. Therefore, it must be concluded that since the Communist threat was known to be, in fact, marginal, the illusion of a real threat was exaggerated by the highest levels of the CIA and State Department. By using the fear of Communism to rally public opinion behind America's economic and military expansion, the US administration was able to generate sufficient Realist rhetoric to justify their true Marxist motivations. Marxist Theory Even though President Truman refused to offer US support for a British-backed coup, he too had economic interests in mind where Iran was concerned.

After the nationalization law was enacted, the Truman administration pursued two main goals regarding Iran. First, Iran was to remain in the Western camp at all costs. Second, stability was to be maintained in the world oil market. However, these goals did not call for undermining the Mossadegh government. Instead, Truman attempted to obtain a resolution to the oil dispute through diplomatic means. The US approach recognized Iran's desire for an end to British control over its oil resources and so worked to distance the United States considerably from the British.

The final revision of the US proposal called for the establishment of a consortium, consisting of US oil majors and Royal Dutch / Shell, to market oil purchased from the National Iranian Oil Company (AIOC). In fact, Truman had to scale back a large anti-trust case then being brought against the major US oil companies, which took a major effort -- both domestically and internationally -- by US policymakers to ensure US oil companies' involvement in the consortium. When Dwight D. Eisenhower became president in 1953, he brought with him the Dulles brothers -- John Foster as Secretary of State, and Allen as CIA Director. The Eisenhower administration was favorable to US business interests, and the Dulles brothers' law firm had often represented US oil companies in legal matters. Therefore, when Mossadegh rejected the Truman proposal of a consortium for the third time (though it was ultimately agreed to by his successor in 1954), the United States began covert efforts to monitor and manipulate the political process in Iran.

The Dulles brothers had actually been discussing the idea of a coup since the November 1952 elections. Just two months after Eisenhower's inauguration, having attained key positions in the government to advance their Marxist policies, the Dulles brothers succeeded in convincing an initially skeptical Eisenhower to develop and implement the plan to overthrow the Mossadegh government. Declassified CIA documents written in the months leading up to the coup show that the US Department of State wanted to be assured of two things before it would grant approval of the plan: 1. That the United States Government could provide adequate grant aid to a successor Iranian Government so that such a government could be sustained until an oil settlement was reached; 2. That the British Government would signify in writing, to the satisfaction of the Department of State, its intention to reach an early oil settlement with a successor Iranian Government in a spirit of good will and equity. The Department of State satisfied itself on both of these scores.

However, meanwhile, the US Secretary of State, John Foster Dulles, said in a press conference on 28 July 1953 that. ".. The growing activities of the illegal Communist Party in Iran and the toleration of them by the Iranian Government has caused our government concern". Meanwhile, in cooperation with the Department of State, the CIA had several articles planted in major American newspapers, which had the desired psychological effect both on the American public as well as in Iran, when the articles were reproduced there. Ultimately, the close coordination of the Dulles brothers, who orchestrated American foreign policy and the removal of Mossadegh from power from the joint helms of the CIA and State Department, a 1954 oil agreement was obtained, which retained nationalization in name only. Real power went to a consortium consisting of Anglo-Iranian and US (each garnering a 40 percent stake) and a few international companies.

Over the decades that followed, there was a reinstatement of nationalization, yet as long as it was under the Shah, the United States did not worry, as US companies continued to profit from oil distribution. Meanwhile, the motivation behind the USSR, with its Communist ideology, in terms of its interest in Iran was no different. At the Tehran Conference in 1943, the Tehran Declaration, signed by the United States, Great Britain and the USSR, guaranteed the independence and territorial integrity of Iran. However, the Soviets were dissatisfied with the refusal of the Iranian government to grant it oil concessions. As a result, the USSR fomented a revolt in the north, which led to the establishment, in December 1945, of the People's Republic of Azerbaijan and the Kurdish People's Republic, headed by Soviet-controlled leaders. The Soviets finally agreed to withdraw in May of 1946, only after receiving a promise of oil concessions from Iran, subject to approval by Parliament.

Conclusion What conclusions can be drawn about American motivation in the toppling of Mossadegh? Perhaps the consequences of the coup may offer the best guide. For Realists, the United States "saved" Iran from a Soviet / Communist takeover. For the next 25 years, the Shah of Iran stood fast as the United States' closest ally in the Third World.

The Shah literally placed his country at the disposal of US military and intelligence organizations to be used as a cold-war weapon, a window and a door to the Soviet Union-electronic listening and radar posts were set up near the Soviet border; American aircraft used Iran as a base to launch surveillance flights over the Soviet Union; espionage agents were infiltrated across the border; various American military installations dotted the Iranian landscape. Iran was viewed as a vital link in the chain being forged by the United States to "contain" the Soviet Union. In a telegram to the British Acting Foreign Secretary in September [1953], Dulles said: "I think if we can in coordination move quickly and effectively in Iran we would close the most dangerous gap in the line from Europe to South Asia". In February 1955, Iran became a member of the Baghdad Pact, set up by the United States, in Dulles' words, "to create a solid band of resistance against the Soviet Union". However, during the years prior to the coup of American and British subversion of a bordering country, the Soviet Union did nothing that would support such a premise.

When the British Navy staged the largest concentration of its forces since World War II in Iranian waters, the Soviets took no belligerent steps; nor when Great Britain instituted draconian international sanctions, which left Iran in a deep economic crisis and extremely vulnerable, did the oil fields succumb to the Bolshevik Menace -- this, despite "the whole of the Tudeh Party at its disposal", as Kermit Roosevelt, CIA Chief of the Near East and Africa Division, put it. Not even in the face of the coup, which both the Tudeh Party and Mossadegh were aware of well in advance of its execution, did Moscow make a threatening move nor did Mossadegh at any point ask for Russian help. For Marxists, the US administration's anti-Communist moralizing obscures the true alignment of political forces while serving as a mask for the economic motivation in the overthrow of a legitimate government. The proof lies in the British and US administrations' premeditated outcome of the coup.

It was the aim of the TP AJAX project to cause the fall of the Mossad eq government... Specifically, the aim was to bring to power a government which would reach an equitable oil settlement, enabling Iran to become economically sound and financially solvent, and which would prosecute the dangerously strong Communist Party. One year after Operation Ajax's success, the Iranian government, installed and financially secured by the United States (the CIA covertly made available $5,000,000 within two days of the Shah's assumption of power, and it would require more than $2 billion in US economic aid and military assistance over the next decade to consolidate the Shah's rule), completed a contract with an international consortium of oil companies. Among Iran's new foreign partners, American oil firms enjoyed 40 percent of the executive rights of Iran's oil industry.

The British wielded another 40 percent, with the remainder in the hands of other countries. Marxist agendas at an individual level were also at play. Roosevelt, John Foster Dulles, and Henderson were handsomely rewarded for their efforts. They are known to have each received $1 million payments from the Pahlavi Foundation in February, 1962.

Roosevelt later left the CIA (formally, at least) to work for Gulf Oil Corporation, a member of the Iranian Consortium, as "government relations" director in its Washington office. Gulf named him Vice President in 1960. Mossadegh's government was extremely popular, yet it was depicted in the US media as unpopular, and the coup against it was portrayed as a victory by a spontaneous popular uprising. If the true motivation behind the coup had, in fact, been to balance against the threat of the Soviets, as Realists contend, this rationale surely would have provided sufficient justification -- both domestically and internationally -- for the United States to take such action. Therefore, there would have been no need to manipulate US media coverage of the event. However, as Marxists argue, United States foreign policy was determined by the desire of capitalists for profits.

Understood in broader terms, the economic motive was fundamental to the struggle for power in Iran. The truth is that the US government needed a "politically correct" justification for using covert action to oust the democratically-elected government of a sovereign nation -- that alibi was the Soviet Menace. Without it, the true, Marxist motivations would have potentially exposed the Eisenhower administration to far too much criticism and resistance -- both from the international community as well as the American people. But on the basis of international security, the likelihood of the US administration having been questioned was virtually eliminated. In 1960, as The New York Times aptly editorialized, "underdeveloped countries with rich resources now have an object lesson in the heavy cost that must be paid by one of their number which goes berserk with fanatical nationalism". Therefore, the framework provided by Marxism clearly illustrates how the exaggeration of the Soviet threat served, above all, as a tool of the US government and was used as an instrument in the pursuit of its economic interests.

Put another way, it is important to distinguish between actual driving forces behind policymaking towards Iran in 1953 and the rhetoric used to justify those policies. The Eisenhower administration used the fear of Communism, a Realist justification, to rally public opinion behind America's economic and military expansion, a Marxist motivation. Therefore, American foreign policy in Iran was generated not by external security interests, but by internal economic ambition. As the Dulles brothers well realized, the international status of countries rises in step with their material resources. Countries with great power economies are, by default, great powers.