Mossadegh

Mossadegh, Kashani, MAIN, Shah, EHM, AIOC, Britian and MI6, US and the CIA, home

=Prime Minister Mossadegh=



Mohammad Mossadegh was born in 1882 in Tehran. He studied all around Europe, mostly in Paris. He became a prominent politiacian in Iran at a very young age and was an inportant figure in the iranian parliment. He was a very popular politican and was suggested for election mantimes. In the 1950's he was elected Prime Minister of Iran. He was me person of the the year by TIME magazine in 1951. He was the first person yo suggest Iran could nationalize it oil. Most of Iran's oil reserves were in the Persian Gulf area and had been developed by the British Anglo-Iranian Oil company and exported to Britain. For a number of reasons - a growing conscious of how little Iran was getting from the Anglo-Iranian Oil company for its oil; refusal of AIOC to offer of a `50-50% profit sharing deal` to Iran as Aramco had to the Saudi Arabian; anger over Iran's defeat and occupation by the Allied powers - nationalization of oil was an important and popular issue with "a broad cross-section of the Iranian people." The idea of nationalizing the oil sparked controversy among the British and the US government. A plan of action was put into place by the Us and UK's goverment called operation AJAX. The CIA convince the US gov that he would become a socialist threat if he were to nationailze his oil and that he could in fact team up with the USSR. Irans location played a huge part in scaring people into beliveing it could be a communist threat.