by: Akhavan Shomali - posted (or last updated): 3rd, June 2009

Occupation: Information Technology Publishing

Mohammad Mosadeqh (19 May 1882 – 5 March 1967) was a major political figure in modern Iranian history who served as the Prime Minister of Iran from 1951 to 1953 when he was removed from power by a coup d'état instigated, planned, funded and executed by the United States and on behalf of Britain.

Mossadegh was a prominent figure representing freedom, justice, and democracy in Iran and supported by all those that wanted a free and democratic Iran. He was an author, administrator, lawyer, parliamentarian, and the Prime Minister of Iran and in the West he is most famous as the architect of the failed nationalization of the Iranian oil industry.

Dr. Mossadegh, Times Man of the Year for 1951

For nearly 6 decades the Iranian oil and gas resources were under British control through the Anglo-Iranian Oil Company (AIOC), later known as British Petroleum and now called merely BP. The British happily bragged that this single control of another country's natural resources was the most profitable British venture in it entire history, amounting to $840 billion (inflation adjusted for 2008).

The U.S. documentary below, briefly describes the incident from the U.S. point of view:

Iranians still claim today that the British Empire's control of Iranian oil resources robbed Iranian children of their birth rights, deprived a nation of its ability to build its infrastructure, and stripped them of their chosen democratic leaders.

In a 1984 documentory called the 'Power of the Empire', the British finally released classified information as the non-discolosure policy had expired on that year. Many released documents illustrated the British control of Iranian oil fields with the use of manipulation of Iranian politics through threat, bribery and coercion and by using its military to close Iranian roads to threaten transportation of food and supplies. During these 60 years, Iranians received less than 1% of their own natural resources and most often these payments were made to only those that were willing to cooperate with the British occupation and control of Iranian oil fields.

In both first and second world wars, Iran was neutral and did not act aggressive and had declared neutrality. However, on both occasions the British declared war on Iran, invaded and occupied and installed a puppet fascist military governments.

During the 1951-1953 when Iran attempted to nationalize its national oil and remove the British grip on Iranian resources, Winston Churchill ordered the British navy to barricade all the Iranian ports. For two years no food, no milk, and no medicine, were delivered and and no ships were allowed to import or export from Iran. Later the CIA operative Kermit Roosevelt admitted in his book that the British were trying to "starve Iranians into submission or death, whichever comes first as long as eventually he would get the oil".

Mossadegh was removed from power on 19 August 1953, in a CIA coup operation named "Operation Ajax", after which he was imprisoned for three years and subsequently put under house arrest until his death in 1967.

In Iran and throughout Middle East and some Asian countries, Dr. Mossadeqh is known as a hero of Third World anti-imperialism (British) and victim of imperialist (Americans) greed.

"Iranians were deeply angry by the British company, which called itself the Anglo-Iranian Oil Company, and its refusal to accept a fair ‘50–50% profit sharing with Iran as Aramco had with Saudi Arabia", according to Ahmad Sadeghi, Iran's History Professor at University of Stanford.

Stephen Kinzer's (The New York Times Pulitzer Winner) and author of ALL THE SHAH's MEN: An American Coup and the Roots of Middle East Terror, points out in his book, "To us Americans, the U.S. coup in Iran is just an intellectual exercise. To Iranians it is something deeply emotional, something they refuse to forget and may always remain the wall of mistrust between Iran and United States".

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