BOOK THREE                                       
AUGUST, 1953

GO

Nine serious-looking men, all wearing charcoal suits, jumped to their feet when John Foster Dulles burst through the double doors of the situation room. The two senior officials only half-rose at the round table. "Let's get down to business, gentlemen." Dulles exuded energy and confidence with every word he spoke. He looked around the table: these were men he could count on in a pinch They included R.E. Steer, the Ambassador recalled from Iran, Kim Roosevelt's, the CIA's best troubleshooter in the Middle East; and of course his brother, Allen Dulles. The rest were all specialists in some field or another.

"The first thing you should know, gentlemen, is that the President has just made an irreversible decision on Iran: not one penny of American aid until Mossadeq is kicked out," Dulles began. "How do you think this will affect Mossadeq, Steer?"

"The announcement, if and when it's made public, will humiliate him. It could pull the rug right out from under him unless we're careful."

Roosevelt spoke up. "We've already leaked it. We gave both Mossadeq's plea for aid and Eisenhower's rejection of it to The Washington Post. If that upends him, it'll just save us the trouble."

Steer tried to digest what Roosevelt had just said. Humiliating foreign leaders was not his kind of diplomacy. And humiliating Mossadeq at this critical juncture could destabilize the entire Middle East, he thought."Hmmmm ..." he said aloud. "Am I reading you right, Kim? Are you suggesting that our policy should be to destabilize Mossadeq?"

"That's the President's decision," Dulles answered for Roosevelt. "You might as well know the full story. Yesterday, the National Security Council, after considering the threat that Mossadeq's control over Europe's oil supply posed to the Western alliance, decided that the current government in Iran must be replaced by one more amenable to Western interests President Eisenhower authorized the necessary action no later than August twentieth."

"Hmmmm," Steer commented again. "What sort of action are you contemplating, Mr. Secretary?" Ever since Roosevelt had stopped in Iran in February, Steer had suspected something was brewing, but hadn't known what.

"We intend to aid Iran, not Mossadeq. It's that simple," Dulles answered. He spoke as though he were coaching a college football team. The men in charcoal suitsł all team mates by natureł nodded in unison.

"Yes. But Mossadeq is the head of the government of Iran," Steer persisted.

"Leaves us only one alternative, right? To get rid of Mossadeq. Right, Steer?"

"Mr. Secretary, I don't think it's that simple. If Mossadeq goes, how can we guarantee that the Communists won't move in to pick up the pieces?" He glared for a moment at Dulles, refusing to be bullied into accepting their decision. Then he continued. "The last thing we want in the Middle East is a power vacuum. With Mossadeq gone ..."

"Good point, Steer," Roosevelt interrupted. "But we don't intend to leave a vacuum for the Communists. We're going to move the Shah back in the moment Mossadeq is gone."

"I see," Steer He objected but half-heartedly, "The Embassy hardly has the resources for anything like that ..."

"Right," Dulles cut in. "It won't be the Embassy that does it. Kim has worked out the necessary steps."

"The code name for the operation is Ajax," Roosevelt said, opening his briefing book.

"It's all clean and simple. The Shah will dismiss Mossadeq. Mossadeq will refuse to step down as Premier. Then we will neutralize his political base. We have the assets in place. We'll keep the Shah out of harm's way until Mossadeq is gone. It will all take three days, and almost no bloodshed."

"How are you going to neutralize Mossadeq?" Dulles asked.

. "That's a detail Foster, I think you'd rather not know," Allen Dulles answered

"Am I correct in understanding that this is going to be a CIA operation?" Steer looked squarely at John Foster Dulles.

"Right. It's Allen's show."

""Mr. Secretary, I think it best if I absent myself from Iran. Been planning to take a home leave, anyway. Kim can handle things, don't you agree?"

"Right." Dulles said, agreeing it would be best if Steer were out of Iran during the coup. It would give Kim and the CIA a freer hand in case things got sticky.

Steer realized that decisions had been made to which he was not privy. He was also bothered by a coincidence. His son's professor at Harvard had managed to predict this the course of action Roosevelt was not recommending. For a moment Steer stood awkwardly at the table, assessing where his duty lay. A CIA coup was not what he had bargained for when he flew in from Teheran. He firmly believed that what the Middle East needed was stability. And it seemed clear to him that sticking an unknown leader, the Shah, on the throne of Iran could lead to more instability. He belied it was his duty to make his case as cogently as possible. All the chips had to be out on the table. "The one thing I would like you to carefully consider, Mr. Secretary, is whether the problem is Mossadeq or the issue of who profits from Iran's oil."

"Not easy to separate them, Steer. When Mossadeq seized the British oil concessions, he made himself the problem." Dulles stopped, satisfied that he had made his point.

"But the British can't hold on to Middle East oil forever. They can hold on only as long as they dominate the Persian Gulf." Steer could see he was losing the argument, "Eventually..."

"Eventually, we'll all be dead." Dulles banged his hand down on the table. He turned to his brother. "One final point.Can we be sure that this will not embarrass the President?"

"There are enough cover stories built into the Ajax scenario to cover all foreseeable contingencies, Foster" Allan dulles answered, as tries, without immediate success, to relight his pipe.

"What about the unforeseeable ones?" Dulles pressed. "President Eisenhower will have plausible deniability whatever happens." Allan Dulles answered with great confidence.

"Any further thoughts?" Dulles again moved his eyes around the table. No one spoke up. "Good. We're all agreed then. Allan, you have the green light. Thank you, gentlemen." The meeting ended within seconds of Dulles' exit.

Kim Roosevelt, returning to his office, wasted no time. His job was to make sure Ajax worked. To be on track, THE SEVENTH MOVE, TRIBAL UPRISING IN ZEMBLIA" would have to be initiated in the Zagros mountains on August 13th. That gave him only 5 days. His first call was to Norman Schwartzkopf. The conversation was precisely one word long.

"Go."


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