Dr. Ervand Abrahamian provided analysis on recently declassified CIA and US State Department documents from the Mossadeq administration. He told the story of the Iranian oil crisis, which would eventually culminate in the coup of August 1953. During the extensive Q&A section of the event, Abrahamian answered questions with topics from the Anglo-Soviet Occupation of Iran in 1941 to the revisionist history surrounding the events of 1953, to the lasting effects of the 1953 coup d’etat in both Iran and the United States today.
Podcast
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Book description
Focusing on the turbulent twenty-eight months between April 1951 and August 1953, this book, based on recently declassified CIA and US State Department documents from the Mossadeq administration tell the story of the Iranian oil crisis, which would culminate in the coup of August 1953. Throwing fresh light on US involvement in Iran, Ervand Abrahamian reveals exactly how immersed the US was in internal Iranian politics long before the 1953 coup, in parliamentary politics and even in saving the monarchy in 1952. By weighing rival explanations for the coup, from internal discontent, a fear of communism and oil nationalization, Abrahamian shows how the Truman and Eisenhower administrations did not differ significantly in their policies towards Mossadeq, and how the surprising main obstacle to an earlier coup was the shah himself. In tracing the key involvement of the US and CIA in Iran, this study shows how the 1953 coup would eventually pave the way to the 1979 Iranian revolution, two of the most significant and widely studied episodes of modern Iranian history.
About Ervand Abrahamian
Ervand Abrahamian was Distinguished Professor of History at the City University of New York. He is now Professor Emeritus of History at Baruch College and the Graduate Center in the City University of New York. His books have been translated and published in Persian, Turkish, Arabic, Italian, and Polish. He has just completed Oil Crisis in Iran: From Negotiations to Coup (Cambridge University Press, forthcoming Summer 2021). He is now working on a book on the 1979 revolution. In 2011, he was elected Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.