225. Editorial Note

Kermit Roosevelt’s memoir of Operation TPAJAX, Countercoup: The Struggle for the Control of Iran, opens with an account of a high-level meeting at the State Department on June 25, 1953. At this meeting, Roosevelt wrote that he gave a presentation based on the “London Draft” plan of June 19 (see Document 221) to Secretary of State Dulles, Secretary of Defense Wilson, Director of Central Intelligence Dulles, Under Secretary Smith, Deputy Under Secretaries Murphy and Matthews, Director of the Policy Planning Staff Bowie, Assistant Secretary Byroade, and Ambassador Henderson. It was at this meeting, according to Roosevelt, that he obtained high-level approval for the operation. No official record of this meeting has been found. Neither the classified study of TPAJAX by Donald Wilber, Overthrow of Premier Mossadeq of Iran (CSHP 208), nor the Claude H. Corrigan study, The Battle for Iran (MISC–16), mentions such a meeting, although the Wilber study does mention that the above-named individuals were aware that an operational plan was in progress. A chronology entitled “Significant Dates in Implementation TPAJAX Project,” signed by Waller and Roosevelt and initialed by DCI Dulles, makes no mention of a June 25 meeting at the Department of State. Indeed, this chronology indicates that the “Department of State and the British Foreign Office granted authorization for the implementation of TPAJAX operation” on July 11. A handwritten addition to the chronology, made apparently by Waller, indicates that the “DCI also obtained approval of President” on July 11. No written authorization from the President has been found. (Central Intelligence Agency, DDO Files, Job 80–01701R, Box 3, Folder 12, Misc. Correspondence—TPAJAX) See also Document 232.