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August 27, 1953 — The Brooklyn Eagle

The Mossadegh Project | September 8, 2015     


The Brooklyn Eagle’s post-coup pep-talk for the new Iranian Premier, Gen. Fazlollah Zahedi •



Iran’s Urgent Problems

Now that the Shah has returned from his brief exile, the dead have been buried, the debris has been cleared away and Mohammed Mossadegh has been transferred from the plush Officers Club to a jail cell, Iran faces two urgent problems. It must decide what to do with the deposed Premier, a rich and powerful man who craved more power, and what to do about oil.

Mossadegh has lived to learn something about the fickleness of mobs. He has reason to assume that he was their master. They had long been slavishly obedient to his tearful appeals, his histrionics, his guile. Now it is considered expedient to place him in the security of a prison for fear he might be torn to pieces by his old followers. His trial for his life should prove to be one of the great dramas of our time.

His successor, Gen. Fazollah Zahedi, [sic—Fazlollah] has the makings of a strong man. He is an extreme nationalist, an important requisite. He is violently anti-British and as strongly anti-Communist. He is basing the hope of his government on an eight-point program of social reforms designed to produce a higher standard of living for a traditionally impoverished and exploited people.

Sufficient money to enable the Shah and his new Premier to ride the first waves of the current storm may be expected from the United States. The government’s tenure will then depend upon the continued support of the army and the ability of the new Premier to arrange advantageous terms for the sale of oil without a far departure from the principles of nationalism.




Related links:

Iran Arraigns Ex-DictatorAssociated Press, October 4, 1953

Easing Iran’s ChaosThe Brooklyn Eagle, September 8, 1953

Basis For A BargainThe Progress-Index, August 25, 1953



MOSSADEGH t-shirts — “If I sit silently, I have sinned”

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