The Rest Is History - 259. Iran: England - 'The Little Satan'

Episode Date: November 21, 2022

On the day of England vs. Iran, Tom and Dominic are joined by friend of the show, Ali Ansari, to discuss Anglo-Iranian relations.  Tune in to hear stories of freemasons, early Iranian analysis of Tories and Whigs, the Anglo-Persian War, Salman Rushdie's fatwa, the ancestor of British Petroleum, and why Iran still sees England as a fox-like, 'little Satan'. Join The Rest Is History Club (www.restishistorypod.com) for ad-free listening to the full archive, weekly bonus episodes, live streamed shows and access to an exclusive chatroom community. *The Rest Is History Live Tour 2023*: Tom and Dominic are back on tour this autumn! See them live in London, New Zealand, and Australia! Buy your tickets here: restishistorypod.com Twitter:  @TheRestHistory @holland_tom @dcsandbrook Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Thank you for listening to The Rest Is History. For weekly bonus episodes, ad-free listening, early access to series, and membership of our much-loved chat community, go to therestishistory.com and join the club. That is therestishistory.com. Anyone who visits the nations of the West and then goes to Britain will see that everything in that country differs from elsewhere. The manners of administration, the style of life, the institutions of education and technology, even the form of cooking and housekeeping and the culture of entertaining. In sum, everything has a special form and nature which is quite different to other countries in the West. The British observe their national rights and social culture and they're much more insistent than others in retaining their laws and ethics, such that they're neither quick to anger nor revolutionary in temperament,

with the consequence that they do not quickly change their political and social organisation. The consequence of this spirit of conservatism is that the politics of Britain changes little. British cabinets last longer, and freedom of thought and opinion in this state is greater than in any other country, even though at the same time one can witness unprecedented levels of prejudice and superstition. So Tom Holland, that was the Persian language journal Iran Shah in 1923. And oh, how times have changed. Oh, how times have changed. And we are interested in the relations between Iran and, well, specifically England, aren't we? Because today England is playing Iran in the World Cup. What a showdown, Tom. You looking forward to it?

I am looking forward to it. Well, I remember the match that Iran played against America. When was that? It was 1998 and I remember that. They gave each other flowers, didn't they? Actually, the Iranians carried flowers. I'm not convinced that the Americans did. And I remember that so vividly because I was in France for that World Cup.

So I was watching it on a big screen in a square in, I think, Montpellier. And the square was packed with, you know, 3,000 people or something. And of all the people in the square from every country on earth, Colombians, Tunisians, Frenchmen, there were only two people in that square who wanted the united states to win and they were both americans one looked like bill bryson and the other looked like steven spielberg and you could see that not only were they gutted that the americans had lost they were absolutely confounded by the attitude of the crowd all their

friends and allies who were madly cheering on iran iran did win didn't they they won one i think so two one i think it was actually in some ways it's it's amazing that iran are playing at all because when the revolution happened um do you know what the uh islamic revolutionary council said about football and why they were banning it they loved it and they thought it was brilliant was they said they said players have a tendency to behave aggressively when they play the sport true enough and in the aftermath of games supporters can also under influences which aren't good for them behave in an unbecoming manner well that would never happen in england no it certainly wouldn't and one of the reasons why um in the end iran carried on playing football is that

apparently the ayatollah was very keen on it and his son actually played quite a high standard. Anyway, but we have the perfect person to tell us whether that is true and more generally to talk about the long and troubled relationship between England and Iran, which is of course, very much friend of the show, Ali Ansari. Ali, thank you so much for joining us on this historic day great to be back so so for those people who don't know ali you're professor of history at st andrews but you're also you're you're you're an exile aren't you i mean that i am that's a very glamorous way to describe you but you are an exile you're an iranian exile and your family fled after the revolution in the end of the 70s i was actually being sent to uh i was being sent in in the classical sense i was being sent here to boarding school just before the revolution in the end of the 70s? I was actually being sent to, I was being sent in the

classical sense, I was being sent here to boarding school just before the revolution, actually, so it was all very well timed. And we were being sent, obviously, because Britain, as your first quote outlined there, was the place to send people to build citizens, if you will. You were being trained as an English gentleman, were you? Yes. To great effect, I must say, Ali. That's what I like to think, yeah. So the history of England's relations with Iran, when do they begin? When do Iranians and English people become aware of each other? I suppose the English are always aware of the Persians, aren't they? Because they know about them from classical sources and the Bible.

They do. I mean, there's enormous, I mean, this is the interesting thing about the relationship. The relationship is much more complex and interesting and nuanced than I think some of the sort of mythology will allow. So, I mean, obviously, there's a perception in Iran about perfidious albion, which is… The little Satan now, isn't it? We're the puppet masters, aren't we? Yeah. I mean, little Satan is slightly deceptive because, I mean, the little Satan basically almost controls the great Satan. So, it's much more…

So, the great Satan's America. Yeah. That's right. And there was a film recently made in Iran, sort of in the Islamic Republic, a wonderful history documentary. It has to be said, complete guff, but, you know, went on for about 40, tracing the history of Perfidious Albion from Julius Caesar through to the present day. I'd love to see that. Yeah. No, no, I can send it to you.

Make a show on Channel 4. It's a great, you know, lots about the Navy and about, you know, the Skullduggery Freemasons. Sounds splendid. And, you know, there's a sort of a continuity about the wickedness of Britain and England in particular. I mean, of course, one of the things we have to remember is that when the Iranians talk about Britain, they tend to talk about the English. So they talk about Britain as Englishy, you know, essentially English. So they tend to conflate the two. And obviously, it's something they work on. But it's a much more, yeah, it's a much more

interesting, I think, relationship. And of course, from the Western side, and from the English side, as you say, Tom, you know, people come along, they know Persia, in inverted commas, from the Bible, classical texts, all and so forth. And they have a particular impression of what Persia represents. When they go there in the 17th and 18th century in much more systematic and larger numbers, they tend to be a little bit disappointed by what they find. But, you know, it's... What do you think they're expecting? Well, they're very rich. You'll be pleased to know they're very, very, they digest Herodotus in large quantities. Excellent. And so they half expect, and you get all these people saying, well, you know, we thought they well you know we thought they you know

rode horses shot the bow and told the truth but uh frankly they don't do many of those these days and um it's all a bit confusing for them and they talk about babylon and you know the place names all wrong and this sort of thing but um but certainly there's a sort of a cultural baggage there which is quite interesting from the iranian side i mean there's obviously less interest there are some uh reminiscences there's some sort of mentions of the island of Britain and others, you know, in some geographical texts. And interestingly enough enough. So Edward I sends an ambassador to one of the Iranian, the Ilkhans, the rulers of Iran, really asking for help during the crusade, you see, and this sort of thing. But obviously, that doesn't emerge. Surely, that's very ambitious.

Yeah, it's complete. Yeah. Yeah, the Persians weren't going to pile into the crusades. And certainly not the Mongols. I mean, well, they did. I mean, they would fight the Mamluks and others, but not on behalf of the Christian West. So those are the initial contacts, but they're very, very sparse. And it's really, you know, in the 16th and 17th century that you get trading links and others opening up. Obviously, East India Company moving into India and obviously developing their trading links with Iran in the 17th century. And then Persia becomes much more prominent in Western, in the English imagination. And Ali, that's because basically the language of administration

in India is Persian. Well, that's, I mean, the interesting thing is, so one of the ideas that I, you know, really try and push in my argument about the relationship is that Britain or England, certainly initially, becomes dominant in India. And India is fundamentally at this stage part of the Persianate world. I mean, the language of administration of Mughal India is Persian. When you go to India, you learn Persian in order to understand how things are going. So when Englishmen first travel, and Brits, I should say, I mean, I'm sorry to say we have to conflate a little bit because some of the first travelers are Scots, actually. When they go to Iran, they're coming to Iran from Indiaia and they come really from within

a particular political culture and that makes it much much more interesting because of you know they understand the cultural idioms of the of the place they're going to yeah so they've got all the baggage because they've been in india they know how things are done and they sort of persia is important to them presumably presumably because of India, because it's basically a gateway to India. It's defensive, really. You see, so basically, the East Indian Company is principally worried about the threat to India from Afghanistan and from Central Asia. So they see Iran as a potential ally. And then by the turn of the sort of 19th century, they understand actually the real threat is coming from Russia.

So Iran then becomes a buffer zone. In that period, Ali, what's going on in Iran? I mean, who's running it? What sort of country, what sort of society is it? So Iran comes out the 18th century, a period of quite intense political turmoil. I mean, it's a bit of a mess in some ways. You get a new dynasty emerges at the end of the 19th century. They emerge into the sort of wider world. And

they emerge into a world which has quite changed from the one that Iran left in the sense of the end of the 17th century. So you have two imperial powers, basically Britain and India, and the Russian Empire to the north. And they're faced with this new dilemma. And what you have in Iran is basically a very traditional pre-modern state facing these two modernizing states, if I can put it that way. And the challenge is quite severe. And they're very enamored in some ways. Enamored maybe is too strong a term, but they're sort of puzzled about what the British and the English are doing in India. You know, why are you there? The English and the, you know, what they do is they basically cultivate relations with Iran in order to make it, you know, to bring Iran on side vis-a-vis the Russians. And that relationship is quite an interesting relationship as it builds up. And the Iranians themselves are fascinated by what the English are doing. I mean, they sort of see this as an interesting development. It helps, of course, that all these people that go to Iran in this period are very fluent in Persian, understand the idioms, understand the etiquette, know how to navigate it.

And it works. You know, these are individuals, political officers, diplomats, and others who are particularly good at their trade in this period. And the Iranians in that way sort of buy into it. And a number of them, of course, go to England in the early 19th century to learn the secrets of British success. What are the secrets? What do they learn? I mean, this is the interesting thing, of course. What they work out and what the British say to them, when you look at it, the British come at this period, post-Napoleonic wars, you know, we're a top nation. Yeah. yeah why are we top nation because we have applied the lessons of the enlightenment i mean basically it's a thoroughly enlightenment narrative they come in

and a thoroughly whiggish right and they basically say to the iranians they say and it's very interesting that they say this is pre you know racial dogma and all this sort of thing they basically say you know 150 years ago we say, you know, 150 years ago, we were a miserable, you know, island race, basically killed our king and did all sorts of nasty things. And it was all a bit of a mess. But we applied, you know, three things, you know, discipline, law, education, you know, and look where we are now. And if you do these things, too, you can achieve all these things. And of course, for many Iranians, you know, this is quite an attractive option. And so Ali, it's basically, it's part of the great game, isn't it?

This great kind of struggle for influence between the Russians and the British. Do the Iranians, are they more inclined to side with Britain or with Russia? Which is more appealing to them? They fear Russia. They fear Russia. Russia has the propensity to send troops in at a moment's notice. The British don't have that capacity. The English don't have that capacity. They're a naval power. They're not keen on sending troops. It's very expensive. At this point, then, Britain is not the kind of satanic figure in the Iranian imagination that it later becomes. Not at all. And this is the core of

the issue, of course, is that basically the problem in the relationship between Iran and England in that sense is that England represents for the Iranians, particularly reforming Iranians at this time, a sort of an aspirational power. I mean, they like the political ideals. What they get annoyed about, I mean, this is a fundamental issue. Iranians have no expectations of Russia whatsoever. They think it's basically rather brutish in some ways, but, you know, autocracies and all that. So they have no expectations of Russia whatsoever. Okay. They think it's basically rather brutish in some ways, but you know, autocracies and all that. So they have no experience.

So there's nothing to betray for the English. On the other hand, you know, they have this sort of expectation that the British will live up to their ideals, which is rather Whiggish, you know, and then basically the British don't.

So they go, well, hang on a minute, you know, you have all these wonderful ideals and, and why aren't you supporting us in our bids? You know, this is the thing. There's that sort of contrast.

And you see this with the Americans, too, later in the 20th century. So, Ali, you sent us an excerpt from a thing called The Journal of the Persian Princes. Yeah. So these are guys who visited England. Yeah. And when did they visit? So they visited in 1835. And they do. So throughout the early 19th century, you get a series of visitors who come in, look at various aspects of English society, British society. They're enormously impressed by things that we wouldn't instinctively think would be the thing.

But it's things like liberty, freedom. They're fascinated with newspapers. They can't understand the concept of newspapers this idea that you publish a hundred thousand papers and then bin it and then start again the next day you know i mean for them they sort of go you know this is amazing they're they're fascinated by you know essentially economic development and industry and one of the things that they do look at by the way interestingly is is the navy you know the navy is something that impresses them the industry behind it i think is what it impresses them they're never taken around to see

you know military parades that isn't what what impresses them and they're not they're what they're taken to see is and the three princes do this is the thames tunnel you know yes they go what they're building a tunnel under the river you know how because this is the hey that? Because this is the heyday of Britain as the workshop of the world, I suppose. That's right. And so they recognize that this is the motor of British power, I guess. But they also love the politics, don't they? They've got a brilliant section here about explaining politics to their Persian readers. So they say, there's loads of viziers and all the viziers have vice viziers.

Although every one of these viziers is a master of his own department, they do not drink water without the advice of each other. They do nothing without consulting each other. Then they go on to explain. They say basically the Tories are Whigs. Sometimes the father is a Whig and his son a Tory, and two brothers, maybe one a Tory and the other a Whig. They said the difference between the Tories follows. This is the Tories.

They say, 300 years ago, we were wild people, and our kingdom then was worse and lower than any other. But through mind, wisdom, and learning, we have brought our kingdom to its present height of honor. And as our empire grew larger by our management, why should we reform and give up our policy, which has done all this good? So that's Toryism. And then Whiggism, they say, we know that it is more prudent to go according to the changes of time and circumstances. Moreover, by the old policy, only a few were profited. And as that government is a general one, we must observe that which is best for the whole nation, and that all should be profited, and every person should enjoy the same privileges. I mean, they're not wildly wrong, are they, I suppose? I mean, the interesting thing is, looking at that,

and my own sort of like reading through it, is that it's clear the three princes in particular are talking to, you know, their interlocutors, in a sense, so people like Palmerston. So it's quite, you know, they're taking a thoroughly red-blooded Whiggism, I have to say. They're hanging around with loads of Whigs. Yeah, and they're basically saying to them, the Tories are all this.

I mean, it's quite an interesting quote, actually. And, you know, they ingest this thoroughly. I mean, they buy into this narrative and they want to go back to Iran and say, look, you know, we can do this. We can develop this. And, of course, the British, for them, for them, this is the way they gain influence. So going back to Tom's comment about the great game, the Russians are notorious in Iran for basically using brute force when they want to get their way. The British, on the other hand, are seen as much more subtle. What they're doing is they're, by persuasion, trying to bring

people over. You can see what we've done, emulate us. You know, this is the way to go forward. And this is the interesting thing, really, about the nature of the relationship is that I think part of the problems in the relationship is the intimacy of it. You know, the ideological intimacy of it, that actually one of the problems is, is that the Iranians find the British model extremely attractive. They also know, for instance, that Britain is composed of four different countries. You know, they sort of say it's Wales, Scotland, Ireland, England. And they like this idea in their own sort of, they look at their own sort of imperial kingdom, if I can put it that way. And they say, ah, this is a way also in which we can manage a sort of a development of a modern, quote, national state. Look at how the British have done it. It's very clever, a little bit of subtlety here, a bit of devolution there, a bit of, you know, this sort of thing.

It's not a, it's something that by the end of the 19th, early 20th century, people are really, really buying into. And they do this, I mean, another way in which they do it is a lot of these people all become Freemasons, by the way. I mean, they all join the Masonic lodges. And, you know, a number of them talk about it, the three princes themselves say, we join a lodge in England. And, you know, they talk about, I think it's the Duke of Kent or something. So of course, currently in the Islamic Republic, you know, it's all very conspiratorial. And they all say, you know, yes, it's shocking bad. But of course, in the 19th century, Freemasonry was very iconoclastic. It was, you know, anti, in a sense, organized religion.

It was anti-superstition. It was all about creating new political realities. And of course, many, even religious figures in Iran became Freemasons and joined up to this and became part of what I would consider this sort of international intellectual brotherhood. So they feed into it. And the apogee of all this is the constitutional revolution in Iran in 1906, which is fiercely modelled on a British system of parliamentary democracy. And it's actually described by some of the leaders as, you know, the spiritual child of Great Britain. Now, if I was to say that to you, as you say, and your reaction is absolutely it, in the context of today, people go, you know, oh my God, you know,

why would anyone say that? But it's in the text. I mean, you know, you see it, you read it. And they're saying that because they're pleading, actually, ironically, for British support, which is, how should we say, in the immediate aftermath of the revolution is sort of slightly sort of fading. They're losing interest. They don't want to annoy the Russians and all this sort of thing. So the Iranian revolutionaries are saying, well, hang on a minute. This is your baby and you're dumping on us. It's a critical moment in my view. So essentially the relationship through the 19th century, there's admiration for Britain on the part of quite a lot of Iranians. Particularly the intellectual class. Yeah. Therefore, also huge scope for disappointment. That's right.

And that's the key. It's the idea being really that because you have huge admiration, you feel disappointed when the English don't deliver on it. So there was a passage, which I think I've talked to you before, Tom, about slavery. So there's a Persian prince who talks to the British minister in Northeastern Iran, Khorasanian in Central Asia. And he says, you who have done so much to abolish the slave trade, do nothing to help us, you know, cope with the slave trade in Central Asia. And why don't you help us?

I mean, obviously, there are obvious reasons why the British don't do anything, you know. But interesting enough, the British official says, you know, he says, you know, to be honest, the prince had a point. You know, I mean, you know, we're official says, you know, he says, you know, to be honest, the prince had a point. You know, I mean, you know, we're not actually, you know, we're not helping them really in some of this stuff with these raids from Turkmen raiders and whatever. But he says, you know, I don't understand. How can you be so, you know, you're well known internationally. This is in the 1850s, I think, 1860. So it's, you know, it's interesting. I mean, I don't want to say let's not get too carried away and say it's all rosy, because of course, there was a very brief Anglo-Persian war in the 1850s. The interesting thing about the Anglo-Persian war, which was about Afghanistan, was that the British actually at the end of the war had a very lenient treaty on it.

I mean, they didn't, it was not a punitive treaty. And of course, ironically, or paradoxically, what happens after 1857 is that it opens the doors even more to British ideas, because people, intellectuals say that actually, you know, the war, you know, let's put it behind us. But actually, the Treaty of Paris that results in it is so lenient compared to what the Russians would have done that, you know, maybe there is some merit in working with the British in some ways. And of course, the British then get involved in a series of economic concessions, partly in a bid by some people, they And of course, the British then get involved in a series of economic concessions, partly in a bid by some people, they sort of say, let's get economic investment in because that will catalyze reform. But of course, it leads to our, I suppose, our next great sort of

like aspect of Anglo-Iranian relations, which is the establishment of the oil industry in Iran. And that's obviously a critical factor as well. So let's take a break. And then when we come back, let's look at the 20th century, which is perhaps a more troubled period. So it's all downhill from here, guys. And we will see you after the break for that downhill journey. I'm Marina Hyde. And I'm Richard Osman.

And together we host The Rest Is Entertainment. It's your weekly fix of entertainment news, reviews, splash of showbiz gossip, and on our Q&A we pull back the curtain on entertainment and we tell you how it all works. We have just launched our Members Club. If you want ad-free listening, bonus episodes and early access to live tickets, head to therestisentertainment.com. That's therestisentertainment.com. hello welcome back to the rest is history and um in honor of uh england playing iran today in the world cup we are discussing anglo-iranian relations with ali ansari um and ali you have

taken us up to the 20th century um things between Britain and Iran, I mean, Britain's been throwing its weight around, slightly bullying, I guess, but not absolutely detested in Iran. There are aspects of Britain that people in Iran admire, but with the 20th century, things start to go downhill, do they? Well, I mean, you know, the interesting thing is, is that there are a number of episodes in the 19th century, which don't go particularly well. There's obviously the, you know, the war, which you mentioned, there's a tobacco revolt in 1891. But interestingly enough, you know, even in 1906, as I said, you know, when you get this constitutional revolution, they still talk about it as the spiritual child of Great Britain. Concurrently with this, but slightly over the margins, is the decision by the then government of Iran to offer an oil concession to an Australian British entrepreneur,

a gentleman by the name of Knox Darcy, of all names, who gets a concession for the exploration and exploitation of all oil resources in southern Iran. Principally, some of around £40,000, it has to be said. Wow, that is a bargain. I mean, it's not insignificant. I mean, it's interesting what people say. Although retrospectively we think it was all a done deal, it took them seven years to actually strike oil

and a huge amount of money was spent to try and discover it. And they almost came close to giving up, it has to be said. But they know the oil's there, right? Because there have been places where oil has been bubbling out of the ground and stuff like that for years. Yeah. I mean, this is one of the paradoxes is that they know there's some oil there. The trouble is, is to find it in commercially accessible quantities. And of course, what people forget, of course, is that it's very inhospitable terrain. I mean, in terms of the work being done, this is a country that has very little internal communications. There's no roads or railways or anything. So, you know, it was a real hardship task in some ways. Nonetheless, by 1908, they strike a will.

By this stage, just to put a little bit of context, the constitutional revolution is going south very quickly. The British have signed a convention with Russia to basically settle their disputes in Persia and other places in Asia in 1907, considered by British diplomats as a great betrayal, I have to say. But Edward Gray sitting in London doesn't worry too much about this sort of thing. He's much more interested in Europe. But interestingly, just to show how insignificant the oil concession was, the Anglo-Russian Convention of 1907, which basically splits Iran into these spheres of influence, basically ignores the oil concession. I mean, there's no, it doesn't even cover

southwestern Iran. Nobody bothers about that yet. They're not, you know, oil hasn't really made an impact in the British sort of psychology in that sense. But it does become obviously after 1908, the discovery of oil, and then crucially in the run up to the First World War, Churchill, as first Lord of the Admiralty, decides that the Royal Navy will switch from coal to oil. And at that moment, Iran becomes a strategically important asset for the British, if I'm the Anglo-Iran, Anglo-Persian stroke, Anglo-Iranian oil company. So whereas in the 19th century, Iran was sort of the buffer state, great game, so on and so forth. By the 20th century, it switches completely and becomes,

you know, the strategic asset. And just to emphasize this, in curious, in that first decade of the 20th century, Britain plays a role as both being a midwife to the creation of the modern Iranian state through the constitutional revolution, but also the establishment of its first modern industry through the oil refinery in Abadan and the development of that. And it's difficult to underestimate actually the impact of this development of the oil industry. I mean, it's like investing in a modern industrial complex in a country that is just not modern. I mean, everything else about it, there was some comparison done about the level of industrial development in Iran in the beginning of the

first half of the 20th century, actually. And the Anglo-Iranian oil company just, I mean, it puts everything else in the shade. I mean, there are no other factories, really, you know, to compete with it. That's the company that's the ancestor of BP. And is there a lot of resentment in Iran at that point, these foreigners, these sort of, you know, Christian foreigners

are coming in to exploit our natural resources, or are people just delighted that the work is there and that there's a hint of modernization and that, you know, the oil is flowing and money will come in? It coincides really with the rise of nationalist thought in Iran. And again, this is the sort of paradox. So British ideas, you know, to go back to, again, some of your earlier podcasts, you know, the sort of imperial idea and the british ideas encourage the development of nationalist thinking in many of these territories you know so iran develops a sort of a sense of nationhood by imbuing all this wiggism in that sense in the sort of idea of progress and you know let's develop our own and it's juxtaposed almost you

know it's all runs up against this sort of development of these, you know, these basically these huge concessionary economic sort of developments that have really nothing to do with the home country. The agreement made, there are two, I should say, there are two major British concessions in Iran. One is to run the National Bank effectively. The British Imperial Bank of Persia emerges, has all fiscal rights in Iran. The right to issue banknotes and so on and so forth. So that's one thing. We should put that to one side in that sense, but it's in the background and it is important as the story develops. But then also the Anglo-Iranian oil company, the deal that's made with Iran back in 1901, and it's revised many times forward, is really for a very, I mean,

it's a good deal for the British or the company in the sense that the amount of, quote, the royalties paid to Iran are royalties based on profits. That's a very unusual way to do it. Now, it might have made sense in 1901, where nobody took it seriously, in a sense. But by the 1930s, or the 1940s, when you get a fully fledged industry making huge profits, but also, you know, the Iranians are never allowed to look at the accounts, by the way. So, you know, what you have is this rather bizarre situation where the company is obviously very protective about what its profits are. And it does pay a significant sum to the Iranian government, but it doesn't basically share the data. It's quite clear that the British government

is doing rather well out of it. The Royal Navy gets preferential rates on oil. And certainly, as you get into the Second World War, it's an absolutely pivotal asset in terms of supplying British forces with oil at preferential rates. And the British government also makes quite a good bit on corporation tax and stuff like that, which obviously the Iranians don't see anything out of. And so they become increasingly irritated by this imbalance. And just on Iran in World War I, in the Great War. So Iran was technically neutral, wasn't it? That's right. But the British and co kind of pile into the west of the country nevertheless,

because they're fighting, because the British and the Russians are obviously fighting the Ottomans. So is that very destabilizing for Persia? I mean, do people resent that? They do, but probably, I think, mistakenly more, you know, actually the critical culprits in this are the Ottomans and the Russians. The British are very latecomers in this. I mean, they sort of protect their interests in the south, but the British really sort of enter the fray once the Russian Revolution takes place.

Russian forces are going AWOL. The British have to come in and pay these forces to keep them seamless. But in terms of the turmoil in the country, it's certainly true that it causes a huge amount of disruption, socioeconomic disruption, certainly. So it's, and there's a famine in the west of the country. People, there's a current mood in perfidious Albion sort of language to blame the British for the famine, but certainly it seems to be that the chief culprits for this were internal turmoil, the Ottomans, the Russians, and the British come in rather the country in 1941. So there's a period of occupation for about five years. And that's probably the first time that ordinary Iranians encounter the Tommy, if I can put it that way. You know, most Iranian encounters with Brits up until then are with diplomats and businessmen and others. By 1941-42, they're dealing with everyday Englishmen, essentially. And it's an interesting experience. And how does that go down? I mean, it goes down, it goes down. I mean, the British, I mean, they also encounter,

obviously, Soviet soldiers, Russian soldiers and Americans come in after 1942. It's a pretty turbulent political and economic period. The Allies use Iran really as a sort of a bridge to, you know, that bridge to victory to supply the Soviet Union. There's a lot of political activity in terms of the fact that the Anglo-Americans and the Russians are basically competing for hearts and minds in the country. So because political life sort of opens up, things become quite febrile. And the political activity also turns to this notion of whether these concessions should be continuing in the country. The end of the Second World War, and then the end of the Raj in India,

that kind of basically changes the geopolitical circumstances quite profoundly, I would guess. But even more profound, I suppose, is the fact that America now is clearly a much more dominant power than Britain. And how long does it take Iranians to realise that it's going to be America that's the great Satan and Britain is being demoted to the rank of the little Satan. So it doesn't take too long, it has to be said. So, I mean, there's a sequence of events that are quite interesting. In 1945-46, the agreement of the Allies is that they will withdraw from Iran six months after the end of the war. And funnily enough, Stalin doesn't do that. Okay, the Russians

stay. So the Russians stay in northern Iran, Azerbaijan and these sort of areas and just hang in there. There is a certain amount of political maneuvering that goes on, where the Russians are offered an oil concession in the north, it is then sort of rather, it's sort of denied politically, there's a lot of machinations, which means the Russians eventually withdraw from northern Iran and don't get their oil concession. What this means is that many politicians in Iran then say, well, if we've managed to refuse a concession to the Russians, why can't we take another look at this concession in the south of the British and actually deal with that? And here we get to the great crisis in Anglo-Iran relations,

which has basically colored the entire relationship since then, which is essentially the oil nationalization crisis of 1951-53, where the are all nationalizing everything. So, you know, this seems to be part of the course. And interestingly, there's a wonderful account by Ernie Bevan who sort of says that, you know, even as early as 1946, he says, you know, it's going to be very difficult for us to lecture others as to what they do with their national assets while we're busy nationalizing everything here.

Britain's foreign secretary. That's right. And he was very, I mean, I think Bevan was, you know, extremely astute and farsighted in a lot of his comments. The problem he has is he has a company that's incredibly archaic in its worldview. And both the British Imperial Bank of Persia, which basically loses its concessionary rights in 1948-49, but more particularly the Anglo-Iranian Oil Company, I have to say. I mean, if there's a villain of the piece, it really is, I'm sorry to say, the board of the Anglo-Iranian oil company that's incredibly reluctant to actually reconsider its relationship with Iran. And in fact, the Foreign Office is often saying, you know,

you've got to make concessions. I mean, the world has changed. And of course, the Americans are bringing big pressure on. Now, here, it gets slightly murkier, because there is an assumption in Iran, of course, that the Anglo-American alliance is solid. They've just come out of the Second World War. It's all, you know, the special relationship. Actually, there's a huge amount of competition between the British and the Americans for dominance in the world. And the Anglo-Irish Oil Company allows Britain to purchase oil in pounds sterling. It's an enormously important asset. So as Tom says, when you relinquish India, you know, that's the balance of payments really goes south when India goes down, right? So India becomes independent. What Abadan allows Britain to do is to basically maintain a certain amount of, you know, great power status through the fact that it doesn't need to buy oil in dollars. The Americans, however, are very keen to ensure that they dominate the oil, you know, that oil will hence, you know, it gives them a stranglehold on that sort of natural,

you know, that sort of primary resource. And so what you find in this period, which is not really detailed in many history books, is a trilateral negotiation between the British, the Americans, and the Iranians. And, you know, I would say actually, in some ways, the Americans play a not entirely helpful role in that either. It's, you know, it's an interesting dynamic. It's not simply the West versus Iran. But that coup, so 1953, isn't it? So Mossadegh, who you mentioned, who's the prime minister. So you have, it's the Pahlavi dynasty that's running Iran. That's right. The Shah, who's so famous to those of us of the generation who remember the Iranian revolution, Mohammad Reza Pahlavi, but his prime minister Mossadegh, he is toppled in 1953. And that's always cited now, isn't it? I mean, it's not just cited by Iranians. It's cited

by people who criticize American foreign policy, who talk about the Cold War as this sort of American meddling in other people's affairs. But am I right in thinking that ultimately that coup is as much British as it is American inspired? So basically, the coup is essentially devised by the British. The idea is, and again, what I say to people is you've got to understand, if you want to understand these things, of course, is that this is a post-war world. A lot of these people involved are all ex, you know, SOE, OSS individuals who think that actually doing this sort of thing is just part of the cause. I mean, it's, you know, they haven't really entered the post-war world yet. You know, this is what you do. Troublesome government, get rid of it. You know, I mean, let's find another way of doing it. And the plans are all then, you know, contingency planning is all done under the Attlee government. I mean, it's a Labour government sort of like thing. They all say, you know, this is just going nowhere.

We need to find people we can negotiate with. I think the critical factor is, and if you look at it in a two-way thing, is the only way it would have actually been done is because the Eisenhower government gave the go-ahead. I mean, the thing is, by the time the coup was actually launched, Britain had been diplomatically, you know, diplomatic relations with Britain had ended, the British embassy had been closed. The operation had to be run effectively out of the American embassy. Why had the British embassy been closed? Because basically, the Iranians were worried about a coup. I mean,

they were basically saying, oh, the British are interfering and, you know, let's get rid of them and so on and so forth. They're worried about the British and a coup. But is that because the British have peculiarly formidable influence with the army, with elites? I mean, who are the people that the British is sort of, that sort of George Smiley is talking to? Well, basically, it's a whole range of it. There's a general consensus among the Iranian political elite. So if you go back to 1906,

you go back to the 19th century, it is that sort of rather schizophrenic attitude to the British, that they are both extremely good at politics, but also they are extremely good at politics but also they are extremely good at politics if i can put it that way so one is that we admire their politics but boy they're quite cunning you know and and in a sense what they're saying is you know we you know that they're all i mean the the the wonder of wonderful nature of this relationship is that

basically the iranians look at the british as people who can do politics better than they can do it. So let's go forward to 1979 and the revolution. There are people in Iran, monarchists, who say that the whole Iranian revolution was kind of spun by the British Secret Service. Is that how seriously is that taken? I mean, I have two jokes. I was like, one is that the common one is they say that, you know, if you lift up Ayatollah Khomeini's beard, it says made in England. But the one that I always quite liked was, which is a slightly more subtle one, but great finding, is that because Ayatollah Khomeini couldn't say Margaret Thatcher very easily, he would always say, my great teacher, you know, and that was, he couldn't say, and people would joke, you know, my great teacher, you know, and, you know, there's this view.

I mean, whichever political faction you are in Iran, you will tend to see Britain as the core of the issue. And what I try and tease out is it's not all it's a sort of a how could we put it? It's a it's a reluctant sort of admiration. If I can put it that way, they're quite impressed by the ability, you know. But so, Ali, in the in the revolution, obviously, it's the American diplomats who get taken hostage and the American embassy that gets closed down. The British embassy, there are no attacks on the British embassy, are there? There are. There are attacks on the British embassy, I think, early in the revolution. But they basically solved it. In fact, there were attacks on the American embassy too in the early stages of the revolution, but actually the protesters were moved out, which is why in the 4th of November 79, when they actually seized the embassy, a lot of American diplom might be this nest of spies and so on and so forth. And therefore we have to occupy it. At that time, the Shah had just gone for medical treatment to America.

So that's, you know, arguably what the spark for that was. I mean, interestingly, there's been a huge amount of reflection in Iran about whether the seizure of the American embassy was a good thing. And only diehards now in the revolution think it was a positive thing to do most people actually even those who actually took the embassy say that you know frankly it got a bit carried away and it's it's caused a lot of problems that you know just on the on the shah for a second so the shah had visited the uk hadn't he made a state visit yeah the queen the late queen elizabeth had been to iran um how how i know the sh Shah was educated in Switzerland, wasn't he? So he's not a British boarding school product. No, no, no. Perhaps unusually for a sort of 20th century monarch.

How much is he seen as a sort of, because of his royal connections and stuff, as a tool of the British? He would obviously not recognise himself as that. And he was very, very critical of that. And there are some wonderful interviews that you can see on YouTube now, you know, with Peter Snow, where he sort of lambasts the British. You know, he says, you know, you guys think you can manipulate us as you did 100 years ago.

You know, it's not possible to sign and so forth. He was very fluent in English, by the way, fluent in French and English. And he conversed very easily in those. But yes, you know, his view was, his own view, that he was a strong nationalist figure in his own mind. But of course, in the popular revolutionary consciousness, people would say that, oh, no, he's a the minute David Owen got up in the House of Parliament and said, we stand full square behind the Shah, she said, that's it. He was doomed. Yeah. Said, pack your bags. It's time to leave.

David Owen, kiss of death. But Ali, I mean, presumably, well, I mean, obviously, the effect of the occupation of the American embassy, all that crisis, everything, is that through the 80s, the great rivalry is between Iran and America. And Britain presumably is in the shadows. But then in, what is it, Valentine's Day 1989, the Ayatollah issues a fatwa against Salman Rushdie for the publication of the Satanic Verses. And that presumably puts Britain right back in the firing line. It does. I mean, it's always interesting why he issued that fatwa, whether people discuss whether it was a fatwa or not. I mean, most people assume it is now. They take it as read. Yes, it does. And it goes to the heart of this notion, by the way, that as much as America is the great Satan,

I mean, for many Iranians of a certain generation, a certain ilk, they will look at Britain still as the source of, you know, the original sin, the source of evil, so on and so forth. They still talk of Britain at the moment, even in hardline circles in Iran, as the evil state. I mean, it's really quite, you know, the great Satan is almost, you know, he's bad. But the evil state of Britain is something really quite intense. They believe we control the Americans. Yeah. Britain is something really quite intense. They believe we control the Americans. Britain is America's brain. Well, I mean, Tom, to be fair, that's what you and I think.

I say this to American colleagues. I say, I'm sorry to disappoint you, but this is the way they view it. And interestingly enough, I mean, there's obviously younger generations have a different view. And of course, it's never stopped. Even many of these people who think this, you know, it's never stopped them coming to Britain for education or medical treatment or so that, you know, they, again, that sort of rather sort of paradoxical view of Britain is there. And they always say, well, our hatred is for the British state. It's not for the British people. Yeah, you know, that sort of thing. I mean, that's what they say. It's all a bit of a, you know, it's a bit of a convenience, isn't it, really? The fact that Iran has been drawn for this group

against both England and America and Wales. And Wales. So it's extraordinary. So three Satans, surely, I mean. Well, the Welsh probably get away with it. Does Wales count as a Satan? No, the Welsh would get away with it. In the same way as the Scots often get away with it,

even though a lot of the people operating in Iran in the 19th and 20th century, certainly the chairman of the Anglo-Iranian oil company was Scottish. What's the feeling in Iran about this match? Would it be seen as having any kind of symbolic resonance? And what's more broadly the state of relations with England at the moment? Well, I mean, as you know, there's been a lot happening in Iran recently. So, you know, the mood, I think, is quite different. I think in official, you know, political circles, there'll be lot of sort of uh geeing up some of the nationalist sentiment and you know let's give

you know the little satan a good kicking and so on and so forth i think for the vast majority of people actually it's it's not going to be ideological at all i think they'll quite like the fact that they're playing england i mean you know there's a lot of to be honest interest and fascination with you know the premier league english football so on and so on i mean they love it so i think in some ways they'll find it quite um quite interesting and and and you know there'll be less vitriol i mean just to give you an example of how the mood has changed a few years ago there's an election in iran and for some reason you know the hardliner said you know you we must vote for the people that you know britain has uh uh has said we vote, you know, because basically there's some British, I think the BBC Persian service had said something like, you know, vote for these people.

And they said, these are British stooges, don't vote for them. And in actual fact, when the vote came in, they all voted for exactly those people. I mean, basically, they ignored their own government and said, actually, we think these people are decent. So, again, I think there's a much, much more nuanced appreciation of Britain among the general public, certainly now, where there's much less adherence to what the official narrative is coming out of the government. And the Iranian footballers themselves have quite prominently, some of them have quite prominently supported the campaign against the headscarf. Absolutely. I mean, in previous occasions occasions these sort of quote celebrities uh sporting celebrities haven't really said anything they've kept uh studiously neutral now they're coming out there's a couple of leading for i mean they're managers now they're player managers and managers

um but you know heroes of the previous world cup and stuff like that i mean they've basically come out uh very much in support of the protesters and the government's actually find it quite difficult to know what to do about them um because they are immensely popular figures in Iran itself. And it's difficult to underestimate how popular football is, by the way. I mean, that's another example of the influence of Britain, isn't it? I mean, the popularity of football in Iran is enormous. It is, in effect, the national sport. I mean, most people talk about wrestling as the national sport. Just on that question about enduring British influence, something that always fascinates me is whether people learn British or American English.

So in Iran, would they still have that sort of 19th century sense of Britain as prestigious and whatnot, and would they adopt British accents when they speak English, or would they do what a lot of people now do and learn American English? I think it's, I mean, from my own experience, and limited as it is at the moment, I mean, I think it's, you know, their English is learned from films, songs, so on and so forth. I mean, it's all learned secondhand. And by and large, it would be, I don't know if you'd call it American

or British English, it's almost like an international English, if I could put it that way. But it's certainly, you know, I think the important point here is that English is the sort of second language in Iran. I mean, that's the interesting thing. I mean, people will learn English. They see English as the language that they need to learn to get ahead. And they're pretty good at it, I have to say. I mean, it's very interesting how cosmopolitan, you know, the Iranians have been. And if you go back even, you know, the past 200 years, there's a wonderful anecdote to the first Persian ambassador who came to Britain in 1809.

And he starts to learn English, you know, as soon as he arrives. And apparently the Ottoman ambassador comes in and says, what on earth are you doing? And he says, well, I'm learning English. He says, what for? He said, well, I'm ambassador to Britain, you know. And he says, I've been here two years and I can't speak a word. And the Persian ambassador says, that's very odd. I mean, you know, I mean, so it's very interesting how they've sort of they're able to absorb.

I mean, there's a certain, you know, going back to Herodotus and the ability of the Persians to sort of adopt and adapt and so on and so forth. There's a certain truth to that. They're very engaged. And I'm always very impressed today with Iranians as isolated as they are in many ways from the outside world and communications, not as much as people reckon. But still, even, you know,

their fluency in English is impressive given they don't really get access. So Ali, one last thing before we go. This thing about the old fox I read about. So there's a poet, isn't it, called Peshawari. And his father was killed in that war that you mentioned in the 1850s. And he wrote this poem, the translation is,

many an ancient house was raised after you crept in. You seize lands through your fox games. You have escaped hundreds of traps like an old fox. And that's us. That's the British. Yeah. And is that an expression that iranians still use to this yes yes i mean they had a huge poster in 2016 of a fox and a eugen jack waistcoat that could be a kind of world cup icon it could be that should be our mascots yes and it basically says you know the evil state of britain has always been an eternal enemy of iran of course you know historically that's not true. But there you are.

That's what they'll put out. And again, the irony of it is that if you look at regional histories, they always look at the Persians as extremely cunning. The Persians are the ones that use sedition to get what they want. And ironically, what the Iranians are now doing is transferring that onto the British because actually the British have done it better. But we're both cunning. I mean, we can both be cunning.

Yeah, and we're both foxes. You know, it's also, but I think, you know, the justification for it, if I can put it that way, is this actually fundamental point that while politics was, the British politics was always attractive to Iranians, they always felt deeply disappointed by British policy. And they always didn't understand why, you know,

the British didn't live up to the standards that they held themselves. And the sad thing is, I think, from my perspective, is that there's a host of British diplomats who all accept this. I mean, if you look at their private communications, they say, you know, what we're doing here is we're letting people down. You know, these are our friends, and we're letting them down. And for that, that's a great tragedy, actually. And I mean, one hopes that going forward uh things can be uh things can be changed well that's a fine note on which to end ali thanks so much um and may the best team win indeed thanks all for listening bye The Rest Is History.

For bonus episodes, early access, ad-free listening, and access to our chat community, please sign up at restishistorypod.com. That's restishistorypod.com. I'm Marina Hyde. And I'm Richard Osman. And together we host The Rest Is Entertainment. TheRestIsEntertainment.com