“The Highest Compliment...”
What’s the Story Behind This Nervy, Suspicious Iran Letter?

Arash Norouzi
The Mossadegh Project
| August 23, 2015                         


This sarcastic letter to the editor, dated the day of the 1953 coup in Iran and published in The Philadelphia Inquirer four days later, was apparently intended as a wisecrack, but augured far more than it let on. The sender, as they say, really hit it on the button...

The Inquirer’s letters section, "Voice of the People", generously permitted readers the option of signing under pseudonyms referencing an occupation (“PATROLMAN”), or even a mood (“WORRIED”).

In his expeditious message, Mr. Irate cheered the demise of the “weepy” Iranian Prime Minister, though a more suitable nickname might have been “CHEEKY BASTARD”...



The Philadelphia Inquirer
Sunday morning, August 23, 1953

MOSSADEGH’S DOWNFALL

To the Editor of The Inquirer:
The highest compliment the Reds ever paid the United States was when they attributed the downfall of Iran’s weepy old Mohammed Mossadegh to direct orders from Washington. If that’s the kind of orders that are coming out of Washington now, let’s have more and more of them.

IRATE

Philadelphia, Aug. 19.



But waiiiit just a second here! What’s the deal with this identical letter to The Binghamton Press published one week later?

The Binghamton Press
Sunday, August 30, 1953

Reds ‘Compliment’ U.S. on Iran Issue

Endicott

To the Editor of The Press:
The highest compliment the Reds ever paid the United States was when they attributed the downfall of Iran’s weepy old Mohammed Mossadegh to direct orders from Washington. If that’s the kind of orders that are coming out of Washington now, let’s have more and more of them.

L.R.


An explanation for these twin letters obviously exists — the trouble is, there may never be any way of unprying it. The only tool left available, therefore, is logic....

Could it have been a single writer, who simply sent the same message to multiple newspapers? Of course that is possible, but Binghamton, New York and Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, despite being only 185 miles apart, are two completely different places. Besides, each letter supposedly originated from Philadelphia, PA and Endicott, NY respectively, assuming they were telling the truth.

A more likely scenario — based on what we now know about the true nature of the 1953 coup in Iran — is that these letters had some connection to U.S. government propaganda. Sure, it may seem dubious, but the idea that these duplicate letters just magically wound up in two (or more?) U.S. newspapers in the same week, with no conspiratorial backstory, is no less questionable.

If, in fact, the letters were planted or fabricated by the CIA, who engineered Mossadegh’s overthrow, then the irony — not to mention the sheer unadulterated chutzpah — would be mind-blowing, would it not?

The 1953 Coup in Iran Was An Act of War | by Arash Norouzi
The 1953 Coup in Iran Was An Act of War | by Arash Norouzi

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Related links:

Did U.S. and Britain Plan the Overthrow of Mossadegh?Weekly People, August 29, 1953

Uncle Sam Had Finger In Successful Iranian Revolt — Fulton Lewis, Jr., October 8, 1953

The Iran CoupThe Lethbridge Herald, August 20, 1953



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

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