Office of the Historian

101. Memorandum From Robert W. Komer of the National Security Council Staff to President Johnson1

Washington, September 16, 1965, 10 a.m.

The whole purpose of your exercise with the Iranian Ambassador at 11:45 this morning is to make a big splash over the 25th anniversary of the Shah’s coming to the throne.2

While the Shah didn’t compromise much of his pro-Western virtue in Moscow, the Soviets made handsome enough offers (steel mill, non-aggression pact) to start the Shah worrying again. He’s stood foursquare behind us on Vietnam, but Meyer is sure he’s worried by our seemingly slow progress there. He doesn’t want to become another Diem, and whenever he worries about his destiny he begins to see rust on his westward anchor. So this, like your call to him in New York, is mostly massage.

However, you could add a specific touch by asking the ambassador to relay your thanks for Iranian help with American evacuees from Lahore. Also, the Shah has just gone out on a legal limb to grant clemency to an American who got wound up in the Iranian courts and was recently sentenced. So a word of thanks for this personal favor in the “Bredin case” would be a nice touch.

Lloyd Hand is sending you separately a memo on details of the ceremony.3

R.W. Komer 4
  1. Source: Johnson Library, National Security File, Country File, Iran, Vol. I, Memos & Miscellaneous, 1/64–12/65. Confidential.↩
  2. Shortly before noon on September 16 in the Oval Office, President Johnson presented Iranian Ambassador Khosro Khosrovani with a message and gift for the Shah commemorating the 25th anniversary of his accession to the throne. For text of the message, see Public Papers of the Presidents of the United States: Lyndon B. Johnson, 1965, Book II, p. 1002.↩
  3. Not found.↩
  4. McGeorge Bundy initialed under Komer’s signature.↩