i. Transliteration

The spelling of Iranian names will follow the form found in the publications of each respective individual. For Iranian words, and the names of those whose publications have not been referenced, this dissertation will follow the form found in the Encyclopaedia Iranica.[1]

1. Introduction

The Iranian pre-disposition to distrust the British has been referred to widely in both primary and secondary sources, yet has not been rigorously analysed in either its manifestations of effects. This essay will examine the effect of this cultural trait on the last six years of the reign of Mohammed Reza Shah, and on the conduct of British foreign policy during that period. First examining the nature of the Shah’s beliefs regarding his British ally, this essay will then explore the effects these convictions had on his conduct throughout his reign. I will then examine the British response to this Iranian trait, and the effects this had on British interests in Iran.

2. The Genesis of Iranian Angst

As Prime Minister of Iran (1951 – 1953), Mohammed Mossadeq, himself a nationalist to the point of xenophobia, stated, ‘The trouble all began with that Greek, Alexander’.[2] The notion that Iran’s travails began with, and have continued due to, foreign interference is widespread, being ‘ingrained in the political conscious of all Iranians’.[3] Iran’s geographical location at the fulcrum of the Eurasian landmass has meant that the region’s desirability and vulnerability has remained as acute as it was since the Macedonian’s conquest around 330 BC; from the Mongols’ search for riches in the West to the Allies’ desire for a secure supply route to the Eastern Front, Iran’s strategic value has led to repeated invasions and occupations.[4]

The relative frequency and impunity with which foreign armies have subjugated Iran, particularly from the late-19^th to mid-20^th Centuries, has led to an Iranian ‘inferiority complex’, as described by Parviz Radji and Hooman Majd.[5] This complements Ahmad Ashraf’s view that conspiracy theories thrive during periods of ‘powerlessness, turmoil and defeat’, the blaming of others playing an important social function in the assuaging of anxiety.[6] The traditionally autocratic, non-participatory style of Iranian government has exacerbated this ready belief in intrigue (as Assadollah Alam, Minister of Court from 1968 – 1977, remarked, ‘We Iranians are inclined to believe any rumour, however unfounded’)[7], and the machinations of foreign powers have come to be an accepted, indeed expected, part of this. [8]

Napoleon Bonaparte’s threat to march from Egypt to India, passing through Iran, induced the first British intervention in that country in 1800, and the crucial role of Iran as a buffer state between the British Raj and Asiatic Russia meant considerable British intervention in Iranian politics from then until the 1921 coup (despite being orchestrated by the British, the accession of Reza Shah to power inaugurated a period of relative independence between 1921 and 1941).[9]

The leading part Britain played in the Iranian history of foreign political scheming has led to the notion of British omnipotence – as Mossadeq stated to the Shah in 1944, ‘It is the British who decide everything in this country’.[10] Mohammed Reza Shah fully subscribed to these beliefs, particularly regarding British hegemony in Iran. The sincerity of the Shah’s views and their prominence in his thinking throughout his reign is demonstrated in the diaries of Alam, the Shah’s closest confidant for ten years, which are littered with the Shah’s allegations of British intrigue.[11] Indeed, following his 1979 flight from Iran, the Shah was to baldly state a ‘longstanding suspicion of British intent’,[12] even asserting British complicity in the 1949 attempt on his life. The questionable reason for this accusation was the father of the assassin’s mistress’s job as gardener at the British Embassy.[13] This dubious evidence indicates the extent of the Shah’s suspicions.

Aggravating Mohammed Reza Shah’s conventional Iranian suspicions was the manner in which he came to the throne, namely through the British decision to dethrone and exile his father, Reza Shah, following the Anglo-Soviet invasion of the country in 1941. The extent to which London felt able to control Iranian politics during this occupation (1941 – 1945) is perhaps best illustrated by internal Whitehall discussions as to whether Reza Shah should be replaced by his own son, or by a Qajar scion who spoke only English and had joined the British Merchant Navy.[14] Crown Prince Mohammed Reza’s instalment was followed by four years of rigid foreign control, during which the occupying British overtly presided over Iranian politics. Biographers Gholam Reza Afkhami and William Shawcross, and the Shah’s own publications record his humiliation by these events, and his ‘plausible personal grounds for anger towards the British’[15]

A result of this early experience was the Shah’s attribution of the major upheavals of his reign to malign British forces; instances of alleged sedition from 1949 – 1979 are listed in his memoirs.[16] The tenuous nature of his assertions regarding the British in 1949 was not exceptional; he was to credit the early-1950s rise of Mossadeq to his role as a putative British agent, ‘a suspicion his posturing as an anti-British nationalist did not diminish’.[17] In 1972 he asserted that Iraqi President Ahmed Hassan al-Bakr, who had helped topple the British-backed Hashemite dynasty in 1958 and was increasingly reliant on Moscow, was in fact a British agent.[18] The diaries of Alam wonder at his ‘incredible’ suspicions of the British.[19]

The Shah’s fears and beliefs regarding the British state are encapsulated by his relationship with the British media, reflecting his perception of the former’s omnipotence and perennial hostility. A fundamental part of this perception was the widespread failure of Iranians to recognise the separation of the British media from the British government, a fact that, due to the Shah’s close control of his own press, ‘the Iranian psyche simply could not accept as authentic’.[20] Indeed, the nebulous relationship between the British state and the BBC, which it funded but claimed not to control, was seen by Iranians as merely another example of British cunning, allowing the government to dictate media coverage whilst being conveniently disassociated from it.[21] The Shah and much of his court were similarly convinced that both the BBC and the British press were ‘the voice of the British government’.[22] Negative press became therefore a diplomatic issue, as evidenced by the 1973 broadcasting of a BBC Panorama documentary on Iran.[23]

Annabelle Sreberny and Massoumeh Torfeh have detailed the Shah’s objections to the broadcasts by the BBC Persian Service from 1977 – 1979, broadcasts which often spread the word of Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini.[24] Radji, Anthony Parsons, British Ambassador to Tehran1974 – 1979, and David Owen, British Foreign Secretary 1977 – 1979, also regularly refer to these objections, and others regarding the British press, whose coverage of Iran was disproportionately negative by mid-1978.[25] Manouchehr Ganji and Radji ascribe this sensitivity to the Shah’s fear of British opposition to his reign;[26] he believed that media criticism reflected governmental opposition, even informing US Ambassador William Sullivan that the BBC’s negative coverage of himself, contrasted with positive coverage of Khomeini, was ‘British subversion’.[27]

The Shah was not alone in believing much of the British media coverage on Iran to be unjust – prominent peer Lord Chalfont, as well as Parsons, James Callaghan, British Prime Minister 1976 – 1979, and other commentators agreed with Iranian declarations of its iniquity.[28] However, the alacrity with which the Shah identified the machinations of British propaganda behind adverse coverage, and the certainty with which he attributed this to the malign intentions of the British state, indicates the strength and nature of his convictions regarding the British and their intentions for Iran.

3. Paranoia and Power

Two aspects of the Shah’s reign are particularly indicative of his beliefs and attitude towards the British – his personal arms race throughout the 1970s and his sudden reliance on the Western Ambassadors in late-1978. Examination of the policies the Shah was to pursue and the behaviour he was to exhibit within the context of his suspicion of the British provides credible explanation for both of these periods of his reign.

Between 1973 and 1978 commentators in the British media, such as The Economist, The Times and The Guardian, and in academia, such as political-economists Fred Halliday and Robert Graham, criticised the Shah’s rapid bid to enlarge and modernise the Iranian army as destabilising to his regime.[29] The retrospective analyses of Gavin Hambly, Amin Saikal, Ryszjard Kapuściński, Afkhami and Shawcross corroborate this view, citing increased corruption, neglect of the wider economy and infrastructural gridlock as the results of this indulgent defence policy.[30]

However, the various reasons for the Shah’s adherence to this destructive pursuit of military power are unsatisfactory. Saikal attributes it to the Shah’s desire to pursue an interventionist regional policy, whilst Hambly, Kapuściński and Shawcross cite his ‘delusions of grandeur’ and love of military hardware.[31]  These explanations fail to take into account the legacy of regular foreign interventions on Iranian soil, and the significance of these in the mind of the Shah.

The fear of foreign, particularly British, conspiracy against him and his country stimulated the Shah’s desire for military expansion. Britain’s many interferences in Iran were interpreted by the Shah as a desire to see his country emasculated and partitioned as part of an Anglo-Soviet pact.[32] Tellingly, his memoirs recall a late-1930s conversation with his father during which Reza Shah relayed his fear that Iran’s army could not maintain Iran’s neutrality and autonomy.[33] Accordingly, his son sought to acquire the means to prevent his father’s fate. Both the Shah’s and Alam’s writings regularly assert that ‘true independence’ for Iran could come only with ‘national strength’ via a modern military, explicitly citing Iran’s recent history as evidence of this.[34] Massive expansion of the military was therefore the Shah’s attempt to insure his regime against the threat that Iranian rulers had, in the past century, regularly faced – that of foreign, largely British, intrusion.

The massive change in Iran’s fortunes which followed the 1973 oil price rises, ‘a stampede of wealth’,[35] also changed the Shah’s behaviour towards foreigners. He grew increasingly supercilious and attained a reputation for arrogance. However, the haughty demeanour with which the Shah had behaved towards foreign Ambassadors since the early 1970s was to evaporate during the final months of his reign. As the crises of mid- to late-1978 developed the Shah increasingly sought the advice and support of the British and American Ambassadors.[36] This sudden reliance on his allies can be seen as a result of his previously asserted suspicions and his belief in the ability of the British to influence Iranian affairs.

The Shah, like many of those who surrounded him, discerned the hand of the British in the tumult which had engulfed his throne by late-1978. This was a product of Britain’s habitual interference in Iran (often undertaken with the aid of Islamic clerics),[37] and the hostile behaviour of the British media.[38] The parallels between 1953’s Operation Boot (for which the British received much of the credit), and the Shah’s perception of his own fall are evident; both saw externally sponsored street protests inspired by foreign propaganda unseat Iran’s ruler.[39] It is unsurprising therefore that in 1979 the Shah blamed British, as much as Iranian, opposition to his reign for the fall of the monarchy.[40] The British had saved him once before in 1953, and in 1978 he believed they could do so again – Radji acknowledges this, lamenting the regime’s ‘faith in our allies to wave a magic wand and make everything better’.[41]

His sudden reliance on the counsel of his British ally, discussions of a nature he would not have countenanced earlier in the decade, was therefore a further manifestation of the complex British-Iranian relationship. The fear of British opposition to his reign, coupled with a belief in British power, was what led the Shah to court the opinion and goodwill of the British Ambassador in late-1978. This episode demonstrates the Shah’s ardent belief in both the puissance and hostility of the British influence on Iranian affairs.

4. British Foreign Policy and the Shah: Giving Hostages to Fortune?

Before discussing the exercise of British foreign policy in Iran during this period, it will be useful first to examine British motivations towards Iran, which contrast sharply with the perceptions of the Shah and much of his court. Shawcross presents various Iranian conspiracy theories regarding British complicity with the 1978 Revolution, of varying absurdity (that Britain engineered turmoil in Iran to raise North Sea oil prices, for instance, or that the Shah was deposed as he had offended British pride through criticism of Western decadence).[42] In order to offset this unshakeable Iranian faith in conspiracy, British interests in Iran should be examined. This will also serve to illustrate the stake in Iran that British diplomacy sought, and failed, to defend between 1973 and 1979.

By 1978, this stake was considerable. Britain’s visible exports to Iran for 1978 totalled £654 million and ensured 100,000 jobs, leaving British arms manufacturers dependent on Iranian contracts.[43] As important, Iran had, in 1971, replaced Britain as the guarantor of stability around the Persian Gulf; in the context of the Cold War, the Pahlavi regime provided a crucial bulwark against Soviet expansion in the oil rich region.[44] The defeat of his Western equipped army was therefore a severe blow to the West’s prestige and security. Owen goes so far as to assert that the Shah’s fall, ‘a geopolitical disaster’, precipitated the USSR’s invasion of Afghanistan.[45] The 1979 Revolution therefore, saw specifically British, and more generally Western, interests in Iran suffer a setback from which, given the xenophobic impetus of the Revolution, they were unlikely to recover.[46] The British may not have liked the Shah’s arrogance or his human rights record,[47] but his regime clearly served British interests and enjoyed the support of Her Majesty’s Government, ‘if only by default’.[48] British interests had a large stake in the Shah’s survival, indicating the extreme unlikelihood of British intrigue in the monarch’s fall.

The British Embassy in Tehran and the FCO in London have been criticised for failing to anticipate the Revolution and the fall of the Shah.[49] The Browne Report cites a lack of political analysis, Owen blames over estimation of the Shah’s leadership capabilities whilst Parsons admits to the failure of his interpretation of events during 1978.[50]  However, all three underestimate the damage done to the British ability to exercise effective diplomacy due to the nature of its activities throughout Iran’s history.

That British diplomats were aware of Persian suspicions and allowed it to influence their policy in Iran is clear. As early as 1935 British diplomats would joke that ‘If a Persian divorces his wife, it is the fault of the British’.[51] Sir Denis Wright, British Ambassador to Tehran from 1963 – 1971, chronicled the genesis of this ‘infinitely complex’ relationship in his The English Amongst the Persians, finding ample justification for Iranian suspicion in the country’s past.[52] Parsons explicitly states his initial desire to ‘bury the past’ through demonstration of British detachment from Iranian politics,[53] continuing the policy initiated by his predecessor, Wright.[54] This strategy, justified on the premise that any other would make good diplomatic relations impossible,[55] resulted in three policies that were to be heavily criticised by the Browne Report. The cutting of ties with the opposition, the reliance on SAVAK for domestic intelligence and the cessation of political discussion of internal affairs with the Shah can all be seen to have had a hugely adverse affect on long-term British interests in Iran.

By the mid-1960s Embassy contact with the Iranian opposition had lapsed, as part of the British effort to disassociate itself from involvement in Iranian internal affairs.[56] Parsons judges this to have been a crucial part of the British relationship with Iran, stating that anything less than an unequivocal attitude of support for the regime would have made relations with the Shah impossible, a direct consequence of Britain’s historical meddling in Iranian politics.[57] The Shah’s capricious behaviour towards those who had displeased him was notorious; he would regularly use Iran’s economic might as a diplomatic weapon, for instance against the Dutch in 1977.[58] His suspicions were also easily aroused – a request for unmediated British contact with the Iranian Army was furiously rejected as improper in 1972.[59] The result of this was that foreign officials would often formally request advice on those it was acceptable to consult with, limiting their knowledge of Iranian politics to authorised factions.[60] The British found this constraint exacerbated by their historical exercise of influence through the religious classes, for instance during the Constitutional Revolution of 1906.[61] That the mullahs, during the late-1970s, formed the vanguard of popular opposition to the Shah was a fact not lost on the ruling establishment. The Shah, like many Iranians, was wont to comment that ‘if you lift the beard of a mullah you will find a Union Jack beneath it’.[62] Given the difficulties caused by the British media’s association with the opposition, as described by Sreberny and Torfeh,[63] formal British diplomatic engagement with the opponents of the Shah would have provided only greater provocation.

The consequence of this British policy towards opposition groups was a complete reliance on SAVAK, the Iranian intelligence service, for domestic political information. That this, and other, organs of the regime rarely gave the Shah a true picture of the threats facing him (largely due to a fear of displeasing him) is evident from the testimony of members of the regime.[64] It is telling that Israel, whose links with SAVAK were close and collaborative, advised against long term investment in Iran as early as 1975 and believed religious leaders to be the Shah’s greatest threat.[65] Being as equally dangerously misinformed as the Shah left the British Embassy far more optimistic regarding the political stability of Iran than was warranted.[66] Owen’s memoirs lament the UK’s lack of intelligence gathering capacity in 1970s Iran, yet Parsons describes the impossibility of this; a result, again, of the Shah’s suspicions.[67]

The effects of this disengagement from the Iranian political scene were injurious to British awareness and understanding of the coming Revolution. The lack of contact with groups outside the elite meant that Western observers had little reason to question the prevailing wisdom of the regime’s stability.[68] This deficiency in political intelligence also meant a grave underestimation of the religious-nationalist aspect of the Revolution,[69] exemplified by the mistaken belief that, as the crises of mid-1978 developed, the opposition could be split between moderates and extremists.[70] The extent of this misinterpretation of the Revolutionary movement is further revealed by Sullivan’s assertion that in late-1978 the West remained optimistic about relations with a post-Revolutionary government.[71] Therefore, by attempting to appease the Shah’s insecurities through separation from those who opposed him, the British succeeded only in leaving themselves dangerously uninformed regarding the strength and nature of the Iranian opposition.

The Shah’s national and personal pride was extreme, and both Owen and Browne describe his dislike of contradiction and criticism.[72] The intemperate responses of both him and his ministers to putative British interference in Iranian affairs meant that, by the mid-1970s, British officials avoided broaching questions of internal politics, for fear of alienating the Shah and losing commercial opportunities.[73] Whilst Browne records resulting success at appeasing the Shah,[74] the long-term impact of this on British interests in Iran was adverse; Britain was unable to pursue objectives in Iran other than those to which the Shah acquiesced, even if this was damaging to both British and Iranian interests.

As evidenced above, the Shah’s reckless pursuit of military might was generally considered damaging to his regime,[75] yet his antipathy to foreign interference was such that the British government felt unable to relate this to the Shah from the position of a concerned and sincere ally.[76] Browne describes Embassy concerns over the scale of Iranian defence spending and its internal effects as early as 1972, yet this was considered too controversial a topic by the FCO and was never aired to the Shah; accordingly, arms sales by British manufacturers to Iran continued.[77] British interests in Iran were such that longer-term diplomatic considerations such as this were subordinated to the caprice of the Shah, leaving the financial and diplomatic capital Britain had invested in Iran overexposed.[78] As Parsons admits, ‘Britain gambled on the Shah’,[79] yet the danger inherent in this gamble was magnified by the Shah’s failure to relinquish his long-held assumptions regarding the British, and his resulting attempts to negate any possibility of British subversion.

5. Conclusion

The suspicion with which the Shah dealt with the British was the chief dynamic governing relations between the two countries. For the Shah, this was manifested through aversion to any notion of British interference in his reign and his attempts (through constraint of British activity and military build-up) to make this an impossibility. For the British government, the magnitude of the financial and strategic investment made in Iran throughout the 1970s dictated that a policy of appeasing the Shah was necessary. Attempts to allay the Shah’s chronic mistrust of the British government were, however, unsuccessful. Indeed, the Shah remained convinced of British malfeasance until the end of his life. British diplomacy facilitated the short-term advancement of British interests, yet this was achieved at the cost of good diplomatic practice. Consequently, the British government was caught unawares by the Shah’s fall.

The Iranian Revolution was overtly xenophobic. Ironically, given his fear of foreign domination, the Shah was viewed by his people as a ‘foreign puppet’;[80] this, and the Shi’ite desire to defy the cultural hegemony of the West were both key factors in the Revolution.[81] Although Britain is now only ‘second to the US in the Iranian demonology’,[82] since 1979 the United Kingdom and the Islamic Republic have conspicuously failed to normalise relations. Incidents such as the closure of the BBC Tehran office in 1990,[83] Tehran’s 2002 rejection of the UK’s nominated Ambassador, David Reddaway (‘a Jew and an MI6 agent’, according to the Iranian authorities),[84] and the blaming of 2009’s anti-regime protests on British subversion suggest that neuroses regarding Britain still exist.[85] Although Tehran denies any desire to acquire nuclear weapons, an attempt to achieve total military autarky through nuclear weaponry would hold similarities with the Shah’s own desires for security from external intervention. As such, it would seem that the Iranian fear of foreign interference is still operative and playing a role in both the country’s domestic policies and foreign relations.

Further Reading on E-International Relations

• What American and European Scholarship on the Iranian Revolution Has Omitted
• Revolutionary Religion: Shia Islam and the Iranian Revolution
• Cartographic Domination in British India
• Exploring Past and Present of British Sexual Governance Across the Commonwealth
• Challenging Historical and Contemporary Notions of Blackness in British Writing
• The Long March to Peace: The Evolution from “Old Diplomacy” to “New Diplomacy”