DÉJÀ VU ALL OVER AGAIN, SORT OF(?)
From Gaddis Smith, American Diplomacy During the Second World War, 1941-1945, 2nd ed. (New York: Knopf, 1985):
The American approach toward Iran during the war was a blend of humanitarian sentiment and self-interested calculation. President Roosevelt and some of his advisors saw Iran, much as many Americans had seen and still saw China, as a friendly, backward land eager to accept American tutelage in everything from agricultural reform to finance, education, and police organization. Roosevelt said he was 'thrilled by the idea of using Iran as an example of what we could do by an unselfish policy. We could not take on a more difficult nation than Iran. I should like, however, to have a try at it.' For the State Department this meant social as well as economic reform. As one commetary noted in 1944: 'One of the main tasks . . . is to break this stranglehold of the entrenched classes and to insure for the mass of the Iranians a fairer share in the proceeds of their labor.' No one asked at the time whether the United States could achieve such an objective. American self-interest focused – to quote another State Department policy paper in 1944 – on 'the possibility of sharing more fully in Iran's commerce and in the development of its resources; the strategic location of Iran for civil air bases; and the growing importance of Iranian and Arabian oil fields.' (101-2)
Note two things. First, the Roosevelt administration's idea of intervention in Iran took place in the shadow of WWII and increased concerns over the potential for exhaustion of allied oil reserves (Smith 103), but the humanitarian aim is present nonetheless. The stated goals of the policy are quite different from the Bush administration's stated goals in contemporary Iraq, however. Whereas Roosevelt's State Department policy was apparently concerned with inequalities and popular access to good jobs, the Bush administration's policy is primarily focused on removing a ruling party and promising to provide basic political political freedoms, especially the vote. I think that the different emphases shed light on the two administrations' different approaches to power and its effect on society.
Second, American postwar policy in Iran was not a great success in the long run. (I admit that I don't know much about the period 1945 – 1980, though.) Will Iraq be any different?
1 Comments:
Hi,
To say that American policy in Iran was not a great success in the long run is an understatement. Between 1945-1980, the policy of
the British and American govts essentially destroyed democracy in Iran and laid the foundations of the Islamic state that Iran is now.
The American and British govts had an active policy of intervention and subversion in Iran. In the 1950's the CIA planned out and had the Iranian Prime Minister Mossadegh assassinated because he showed signs of independence in policy regarding oil concessions to british and american oil companies. Mossadegh was a democratically elected leader and his assassination and the consequent installation of Reza Pehelvi as the Shah of Iran destroyed its democracy. The Shah spent in excess, and did little for the Iranian economy and its people, and his unpopularity as an american prop led to the rise of Ayatollah Khomeini. There is a strong reason for the anti americanism of Khomeini which is grounded in international politics. There were attempts to subvert the government of Khomeini and others. There was an assassination bid on the Iranian supreme council, where 22 of 24 or so members of the supreme revolutionary council were killed, among the survivors were Rafsanjani. The Reagan administration later did a deal of some sort with them wherein these activities were ended..
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