After the Countercoup: Advising the Imperial Armed Forces of Iran
Abstract : Iran in the 1950s was in the cross hairs of the Cold War power struggle between the United States and the USSR. Strategically located, Iran became critical to the foreign policy endeavors of the Eisenhower Administration in the Middle East. After the decision to force Mohammed Mossadeq to retire as Prime Minister, the United States gave more than $700 million in mutual security assistance to the Shah of Iran from 1953-1959. In addition to the money, the United States faced the challenge of transitioning the Iranian Armed Forces from an organization used by Iranian monarchs to quell unrest in the major population centers into a collective security partner with a trained and equipped military that could fight a defensive campaign against a possible Soviet invasion. A Military Assistance Advisory Group was created and advisory efforts began. Iranian history, international rivalries, and the strategic constraints of continuous interference from policy makers in Washington and the Shah's embellished interests for Iran weighed heavily on the effort. This case study discusses the strategic context of Iran in the 1950s, the national-level deliberations regarding the importance of Iran and the amount of assistance it required from the United States, and whether or not the USSR was deterred from intervening in Iran due to the United States' demonstrable commitment there. The case study attempts to inform future policy makers as to the roles and organizations necessary to conduct foreign internal defense and advise the militaries of allied nations. Success or failure at advisory operations can have strategic consequences.
The Eagle and the Lion: The Tragedy of American-Iranian Relations
A leading scholar of Iran explores the American-Iranian relationship--once a close friendship--penetrating the hidden social and political processes of both countries and tracing their joint history from the 1940s through the bizarre Iran-Contra affair and its aftermath. Illustrated.
How to Win in Afghanistan
General Sir Gerald Templar's admonition during the Malayan Emergency that 'the answer (to the insurgency) lies not in pouring more troops into the jungle, but in the hearts and the minds of the people' has echoed through the ensuing half-century and has become the basic precept on which counter-insurgency campaigns are - or apparently should be - designed. Nowadays, hardly a day passes in which some journalist or general is not reminding us that there is no military solution to the war in Afghanistan. Echoing this proposition, in January 2009, the Secretary General of NATO argued that good governance 'would suck the oxygen out of the insurgency'. Similar statements were made about the war in Iraq; to argue against Bush's 2007 'surge' of troops and to emphasise that here lay a 'quagmire' - dreaded by all in the US Congress and the New York Times - from which immediate withdrawal was the only solution.