Flaming Nationalism
November 28, 1951 — The Knickerbocker News

The Mossadegh Project | March 7, 2014                    


Lead editorial in The Knickerbocker News newspaper of Albany, New York:



Waiting Game in Iran

Premier Mohammed Mossadegh, home again in Iran after an absolutely fruitless visit to the United States and the U.N., nevertheless won an overwhelming vote of confidence yesterday in the Persian Lower House of Parliament. Which would seem to illustrate that in Persia, as elsewhere, logic bows before emotion when a skillful politician manipulates prejudice in his own favor.

The leader of opposition to Mossadegh’s regime, Jamal Emami, made a vain attempt to point out that Dr. Mossadegh had failed in his mission. He further charged that the premier was leading the country to ruin, and by allowing confusion to prevail and not curbing the Communists, the government head had forfeited any hope of American aid.

Dr. Mossadegh, however, made it appear in his report that Iran’s ambitions had been thwarted by British intrigue—thereby providing the Parliament and people with the same old whipping-boy. The fact that an American deal with Persia would jeopardize America’s own widespread oil interests and condone the Persian oil grab naturally went unmentioned.

So much for logic, which is a negotiable commodity only among people conditioned to recognize it. Clearly the Persians are not. In Iran today the fire of nationalism consumes everything in its path.

Apparently there’s nothing to be done now except wait for the blaze to burn down a little.


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Related links:

IRAN: Empty Hands | TIME magazine, November 26, 1951

A Bad Break Is Feared | The Knickerbocker News, October 17, 1951

We Asked For It. | November 16, 1951 editorial



MOSSADEGH t-shirts — “If I sit silently, I have sinned”

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