YESTERDAY’S events in Persia display all the elements of Ruritanian fiction—including the indispensable one of surprise. Two days ago nothing appeared more conclusive than MOSSADEQ’S victory over his enemy, the Throne. The Shah’s last card seemed to have played and trumped when new Prime Minister he had secretly appointed, Gen. ZAHEDI, [Fazlollah Zahedi] to the hills, and he himself departed abroad with his Queen. [Soraya Esfandiari] Now the fortunes of the contestants are dramatically reversed. Gen. ZAHEDI has wrested Government from Dr. MOSSADEQ in Teheran, although is not yet clear how far his control extends; Dr. FATEMI, Foreign Minister, is reported have been “torn to pieces”; and the Shah, reading of these events on the cable-tape in his Rome hotel, is apparently preparing to return. [Hossein Fatemi was not harmed at this point]

But the fictional parallel does extend to the provision of a hero. It is not much easier to admiration for the successful protagonists in this drama than sympathy for their foes. Gen. ZAHEDI, indeed, has acted with boldness and courage. But the comparative ease with which yesterday’s coup was carried out shows the degree of popular support on which the Shah could have counted had he stood up Dr. MOSSADEQ earlier. The Shah had the constitutional power to do so; he had, as is now manifest, the loyalty of the mass of the people; and he had resolute officers. He will continue to need all these assets and must display the utmost resolution now to restore that long misgoverned land.

Whatever turn events now take, it is obvious that the immediate future will be largely by what the Persian Communists do—and how they are dealt with. The Tudeh Party, nominally outlawed, is in fact stronger, better organised and more active than ever before. Pursuing the copy-tactics of Communism, it has backed Dr. MOSSADEQ in his struggle with the Shah. But Dr. MOSSADEQ can have had no illusions about the reliability of his Communist allies; they were just as hostile to himself as to the Throne. As heirs-apparent to his ruinous rule, their policy was to help him to make it absolute, so that there should be no rival source of power to dispute their accession. Events have not worked out accordance with this expectation; but although the classic “revolutionary situation” has arisen sooner and in different circumstances, the Communists are not likely to be less prompt in trying to exploit it.

If the Mossadeq nationalists show fight the Tudeh will doubtless continue to back them, with the same object as before. If Gen. ZAHEDI succeeds in consolidating his regime, the Communists are likely to be a more dangerous threat to the Government than any pro-Mossadeq resurgence. To that extent the Shah is right in claiming that “anyone not a Communist is faithful to me and the Monarchy.” The prospect lends a fresh and potentially sinister significance to the admonition which Mr. MALENKOV addressed to Persia in his recent speech. [Soviet Premier Georgy Malenkov] There was more than a hint of menace in his statement that “it depends on the Teheran Government whether Soviet-Persian relations develop along the path of good-neighbourly relations.” The hint, with its reference to “frontier problems”, can scarcely be other than sharpened if Persia now has a Government in open conflict with the local Communists. The Soviet reaction to yesterday’s coup will be the development most anxiously watched by other, nations, which have no concern with the internal affairs of Persia, and certainly no desire to interfere in them. [What poetic irony]