Perfidious Albion? Britain, the United States and Triangular Diplomacy with the Qavam Government in Iran, 1946-47

Traditionally, Anglo-American relations in Iran during the 1940s are depicted as strained due to United States perceptions of British imperialism. This paper will re-evaluate this relationship using the official records of the British Foreign Office and personal correspondence of diplomats including British Ambassador to Tehran Sir Reader Bullard (1939-46), Minister in Moscow Frank Roberts (1945-47) and United States Ambassador George Allen (1946-47). Although it is apparent through the latter’s discussions with President Truman that the United States intended to supplant British influence, Anglo-American representatives in Tehran cooperated closely in pressuring Iran into a firmer anti-Communist policy. Evaluating this cooperation will involve comparison of the individual tactics of the two allies in pursuing their strategic goals. Following the seeming resolution of the Azerbaijan question by April 1946, Anglo-American concerns centred on the Soviet-Iranian oil agreement, inclusion of three Tudeh ministers in the Iranian Cabinet, and rapid growth of Tudeh influence amongst the British oilfields in southern Iran. Whilst Britain preferred heavy-handed brinkmanship symbolised by the dispatch of nearly ten thousand troops to the Iran-Iraq border in August 1946, the United States adopted a more subtle approach. Ambassador George Allen cultivated personal relations with the Shah, characterised by frequent tennis games, to intervene in the fragile domestic power balance between Mohammad Reza Pahlavi and Prime Minister Ahmad Qavam. This tactical dichotomy was complimentary in achieving short-term goals, but ultimately self-destructive for longer-term British influence due to Iranian perceptions of ‘perfidious Albion’. In the short-term, it will be concluded that, contrary to traditionalist United States histories of the 1946 crisis, the heavy-handed British approach was equally significant in persuading Qavam to adopt a stronger policy in resisting Tudeh influence. This peaked with the dismissal of the Tudeh ‘camels’ (as termed by Bullard’s successor John Le Rougetel), due to the combination of overt brinkmanship with more veiled personal threats from the Ambassador. Le Rougetel has been interpreted as a weak choice to replace Bullard due to his lack of regional experience, but by balancing threats with a more sympathetic attitude towards Qavam, whom Bullard dismissed as a Soviet stooge, he achieved far more for British policy. However, leading up to the Majlis rejection of the Soviet-Iranian oil agreement in 1947, United States influence noticeably supplanted Britain, fulfilling Truman’s long-term objectives. This is evident through comparison with Qavam’s visit to Moscow in February-March 1946, during which British Minister Frank Roberts became a frequent confidant.