The CIA’s First Coup

For a long time, there was a path to peace. The United Nations General Assembly, for decades, approved resolution after resolution that proposed a nuclear weapons-free zone in the Middle East. Iran approved the resolutions. The US and Israel vetoed them. Only the US and Israel could have nuclear weapons in the region.
The Brookings Institution, in 2009, predicted the illegal US-backed Israeli attack on Iran. They published an analysis paper titled “Which Path to Persia?” There were two paths: “regime change or a military attack on Iran.” For the attack to be successful, the US needed “to strike only when there is a widespread conviction that the Iranians were given but then rejected a superb offer.” President Trump wrote on Truth Social that the Iranians rejected his nuclear deal. “I gave Iran chance after chance to make a deal,” but “they just couldn’t get it done.”
Once negotiations were off the table, the goal was “to destroy key Iranian nuclear facilities.” To achieve this goal, Brookings advised Israel “mount the airstrikes, rather than the United States… In the expectation that both international criticism and Iranian retaliation would be deflected away from the United States and onto Israel.” The Times of Israel admitted, “[President Trump] offered support for Israel’s decision to launch a series of devastating raids in Iran, showing a willingness to embrace the use of military force to set back Tehran’s nuclear program.”
One crucial event shaped US and Iranian relations. In 1953, the CIA overthrew the democratically elected leader of Iran in a coup. Foreign Policy wrote, “[Muhammad] Mosaddeq is widely considered to be the closest thing Iran has ever had to a democratic leader.” Mosaddeq worked to nationalize Iran’s oil industry away from US and British oil companies. An oil industry Winston Churchill described as a “prize from fairyland far beyond our brightest dreams.”
Ervand Abrahamian wrote in “The Coup”, “The State Department and the Foreign Office met in November 1952 and asked the CIA and MI6 to prepare a joint plan to overthrow [Muhammad] Mossadeq.” The United States participated in the coup because of “the dangerous repercussions that oil nationalization could have throughout the world.” “The CIA and MI6 named their joint operation ‘AJAX’.” President Eisenhower approved the covert operation.
The National Security Archive wrote, on “August 19, 1953… Reportedly 200 people were killed,” in a battle at Prime Minister Mossadeq’s house. Mosaddeq “escaped over his own roof, only to surrender the following day.” The CIA coup restored the monarchy of Muhammad Reza Shah. Henry Kissinger called the shah “the rarest of leaders, an unconditional ally.” The Harvard Crimson admitted, “The Shah greatly expanded the military and turned it against his own people… the army murdered more than 50,000 Iranians.”
The Brookings Institution concluded this was the best path to Persia: a US-backed Israeli attack on Iran. At the taxpayers’ expense, Israeli pilots dropped US-manufactured missiles from US-manufactured fighter jets on Tehran. Since 1953, Washington has overthrown any government it doesn’t like.

Anton Porcari

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