611.41/12–2050
Memorandum by the Director of the Office of Greek, Turkish, and Iranian Affairs (Rountree) to the Assistant Secretary of State of Near Eastern, South Asian, and African Affairs (McGhee)1
US–UK Divergencies on Iran
Despite our repeated efforts over the last six or seven months, we are not only getting no closer to reaching an understanding with the British on Iranian matters, but have actually lost ground. The two attached telegrams, one from London and the other from Tehran, show fairly clearly how far apart our thinking is. There is also attached a despatch from our Embassy in Tehran describing the political activities of the Anglo-Iranian Oil Company.2
To me it seems crystal-clear that the traditional British policy in Iran has not changed one iota despite the present world situation. They are still determined to let AIOC come first and to permit the Iranian internal situation to remain in a constant state of turmoil since that will (1) create such a need for increased royalties that the Iranian Government will be obliged to accept the supplemental AIOC agreement as it now stands, and (2) permit the AIOC to operate as it has in the past, bribing deputies and Government officials and being able to operate as it wishes in the absence of a strong Government.
It seems to me incredible that the British would expect us to believe the nonsense put forward in the attached telegram from London and I can only suspect that they are taking this attitude in order to discourage our activities there and to keep us from interfering with any political changes they may wish to make in Iran. This Foreign Office attitude, which is of course actually an AIOC attitude, is even more difficult to comprehend in view of the recent military discussions with the British where there seemed to be a considerable meeting of minds both on the need for keeping Iran strong during the Cold War period and on the action to be taken in the event of an emergency.
While the results of our efforts have to date been most discouraging, I feel it essential that we keep trying. I am inclined to doubt that any further high level talks at this time will really solve our problems since they usually result only in assurances of a general nature which are never implemented in actual British operations in Iran. We have [Page 635] been toying with the idea in GTI of proposing to the British the setting up of a working level study group which could spend some time exhaustively exploring the Iranian situation and preparing a report for the higher level which could then attempt to reach a general agreement. Such a group on our part might include Messrs. Rountree, Ferguson, and Funkhouser,3 and possibly someone from DRN. If it should take place in London, I would not expect to stay more than a week but the others might remain as long as a month if necessary.
This is only a very tentative idea, but I think it may offer some possibilities. If nothing else, we may by this approach be able to introduce a note of realism into British thinking regarding Iran which might lead to some control over the activities of AIOC. At the moment it seems entirely clear that the AIOC dominates British policy in Iran and anything we can do to induce the British Government to escape from its bondage is worth trying.
I would appreciate your views on this suggestion as soon as conveniently possible.4
- The memorandum was drafted by Ferguson.↩
- None of the documents under reference was found attached to the source text; however a reference at the end of the memorandum indicates that they were telegrams 1339 and 3450, p. 630 and supra, respectively, and despatch 404, not printed.↩
- Richard Funkhouser, international economist in the Department of State.↩
- No reply to this memorandum has been found in the Department of State files.↩