740.0011 European War 1939/3444: Telegram
The Chargé in Iran (Engert) to the Secretary of State
[Received 1 p.m.]
117. 1. As the theater of war widens the nervous tension here is [increasing?]. Although political circles are more reserved and noncommittal than ever, it is clear that the crisis on the western front is having a profoundly disturbing effect on the Iranian Government. Iran’s attitude toward every question of foreign policy is of course decided by the Shah which means that irrevocable decisions may be taken overnight without previous discussion. No one knows what is happening behind the scenes but the swiftly moving political and military events are gradually altering the outlook. The Iranian masses are practically neutral or indifferent in thought and feeling. The principles the Allies are fighting for mean little to a people who can hardly be expected to understand democratic ideals, while among the governing classes and army there is a distinct tendency to favor the totalitarian regimes as best calculated to preserve internal order. See also paragraph 2 my telegram No. 2, January 3, and my telegram No. 113, May 24.24
2. Iran is of course much less exposed to German than to Russian aggression but usually well informed quarters believe that the effects of German military successes will soon be felt here. In fact it is rumored that the Reich has already offered Iran a joint Russian-German guarantee against “British aggression” and the German Legation here is combining boasts with veiled threats in talking to Iranians. A clever argument they use is that it was Hitler who prevailed on Stalin to leave Finland, an independent and non-Bolshevist Government, and they promise to do as much for Iran! In Germanophile circles one also hears the obviously inspired statement whispered that as soon as Germany has won the war she will not continue her present temporary understanding with the Soviets and could therefore assure Iran that Russia would not be permitted to expand southward. Incidentally, German propaganda promises a victorious Germany would see that Bahrein was returned to Iran.
[Page 633]3. As Germany cloaks most of her political activities in Iran under commercial guises her principal aim is stated to be to increase the area where trade is closely regulated and organized on a bilateral basis at the expense of course of countries adhering to multilateral trade principles. The creation of such an immense Nazi and Soviet economic bloc would also give them overwhelming political influence in the Near East and Middle East to the exclusion and extinction of all democratic influences.
4. In the meantime I learn that some 300 alleged German commercial travelers have recently arrived in Iran via Russia making a total of approximately 2000 male German nationals of whom about 1500 are said to be in Tehran and the remainder in the provinces. In view of fifth column activities elsewhere a similar danger is not excluded here. There is evidence that Germans and Russians have suborned several high officials and many minor ones and although their methods are often obvious and crude the technique of subversion as a weapon of conquest has been well thought out. Lack of Iranian watchfulness is illustrated by the fact that the British have just discovered that 2 of the 5 German merchant vessels at Bander Shahpur (see the Legation’s despatch No. 1712, October 26, 193925) were using radio transmitter sets which had been sealed by the Iranian authorities. The latter expressed surprise and merely resealed them instead of removing them from all five ships. British and French Ministers are now insisting that any suspicious activities of Germans and Russians must be promptly checked and that persons whose bona fide occupation cannot be established must be expelled.