All the Shah's Men: An American Coup and the Roots of Middle East Terror (MP3 CD)

Rating:
Summary: What happend to Mossadegh?
Review: The topline in this book is quite simple, how does Kermit Roosevelt, working for the CIA, execute the role model regime change operation in Iran in 1953, replacing the Time Man of the Year, Mohammed Mossadegh, with Mohammed Reza Shah.

I usually like Kinzer's writing style, having read his columns for years in the New York Times. He uses the same Graham Greene model of fast narration, time shifts and strong characterization to build the suspense in this novel.

The couple of negative points are that he has not drawn much inference from this episode to other geopolitical events of the world and what are the cause-effects of this incident. Hopefully, we will wait for the sequel.

All in all, well worth a read.

Fred G. Sanford


Rating:
Summary: The Evolution of Persia into Modern Day Iran
Review: This book gives a fascinating history of Iran in the early to middle 20th century. It made the subsequent modern history of Iran much clearer for me, especially the embassy hostage incident and the anger at the US/CIA as an imperialist "Great Satan". My only quarrel with the book is that it would have been better if it were organized on a more linear timeline, rather than jumping forward and backward in time. Still, a very informative and engaging book to read. Also check out the author's "Crescent and Star: Turkey Between Two Worlds" and Robin Wright's "The Last Great Revolution : Turmoil and Transformation in Iran".

Rating:
Summary: All the Shah's Men: An American Coup and the Roots of Middle
Review: This comprehensive--and most current--account of the nationalization of the Anglo-Iranian Oil Company under the leadership of Mohammad Mossadegh in 1951 details the reaction of the company, the British government, and US political leadership to that historic event. Mossadegh had become "a defining figure whose ideas, for better or worse, were reshaping history," a fact that the British were simply not willing, or able, to accept. The ensuing crisis pushed Iran into economic bankruptcy and political chaos, vulnerable to Soviet designs. In 1952, Churchill and Eisenhower agreed to get rid of the Iranian prime minister using covert activities of the CIA. The consequences proved monumental for both Iran and the whole region. Seasoned New York Times reporter Kinzer offers a well-researched and attractive book that is more journalism than scholarship. Sources for the numerous quotations appear in endnotes rather than footnotes, and some quotations are from secondary sources whose reliability many scholars have questioned. However, on the whole, this is a valuable and informative work for students of international affairs, with a moving account in the epilogue of the author's visit to Mossadegh's estate, where the leader was forced to spend the last years of his life and where he is buried.

Rating:
Summary: Fascinating.
Review: This is a fascinating book. It reviews the cycle of interference in the affairs of Iran by Britain and the U.S.A. and how these activities, and the response of the Shah ultimately helped shape the events in Iran of the late 1970's and thereafter. It also helped show how weak the Shah was as far as a leader. As someone without a lot of baseline knowledge of Iran, I learned as lot and one wonders what type of country Iran would have been now had there been better planning both inside and outside of Iran in the 1950's.


Rating:
Summary: Interesting story, a bit too black and white
Review: This is an easy read which provides a good deal of information about the history of U.S. involvement in Iran, some of which is important to understanding recent mideast politics. The book's claim that the U.S. role in the 1953 coup contributed to bin Laden's hatred of the U.S. seems plausible.
I suspect it exaggerates the extent to which Mosaddegh was noble and the Shah evil. And despite its argument that no Soviet-backed coup was imminent, the book provides plenty of reason to suspect that the Soviets could have overthrown a government as weak as Mosaddegh's and that they might have tried once they chose a clear successor to Stalin.