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Memorandum of Conversation, by the Director of the Office of Near Eastern and African Affairs (Murray)
The Iranian Minister called on me today, after he had seen the Secretary.
The purpose of Mr. Shayesteh’s call was to impress upon me the desperate situation in which he said his Government finds itself by reason of the attitude of the Russian military authorities in occupation of northern Iran.8 According to the Minister, the Russians do not permit the Iranian Government to despatch troops to the northern part of the country, and are in fact acting in such a way that all Iranian administration in the north may soon become impossible.
The Minister said he has been instructed by his Government to urge that particular attention be given to the desperate situation in Iran at the forthcoming high-level conference. He said he hoped we would not merely lump his country in with other small countries, with an expression on the part of this Government of our interest in the right of little countries to have governments of their own choosing and to enjoy the benefits of the Atlantic Charter.9
I assured the Minister that we were bearing the Iranian situation in mind in connection with the high-level conversations, and I was certain that it would be fully discussed at that time.
The Minister then informed me that the Shah of Iran10 would be delighted to offer one of his palaces to the President in case the meeting of the Big Three takes place in Tehran. I informed the Minister that we had already received this information from our Embassy in Tehran, and had instructed the Ambassador to express the deep appreciation of this Government for the courteous offer of the Shah and to state that the matter was being referred to the President. I told the Minister that I was not informed as to where the meeting would take place, but that in any case he might assure his Government of our deep appreciation of this courteous gesture on their part.
- For documentation on the attitude of the United States toward the British-Soviet military occupation of Iran, see Foreign Relations, 1941, vol. iii, pp. 383 ff.↩
- Joint statement by President Roosevelt and Prime Minister Churchill, August 14, 1941, ibid., vol. i, p. 367.↩
- Mohammad Reza Shah Pahlavi.↩