In 1953, Iran’s democratically elected Prime Minister, Mohammad Mossadegh, was overthrown in a coup backed by the CIA and Britain’s MI6.
But the story began decades earlier — with oil.
After Iran moved to take control of its own oil industry, Mossadegh found himself confronting one of the most powerful empires in the world. Britain fought to regain control of Iranian oil, and the crisis ultimately led to Operation Ajax, the covert operation that helped remove Mossadegh from power and strengthen the rule of Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi.
This video traces the story from the early British oil concessions and the origins of what would become BP, through Mossadegh’s nationalization of Iran’s oil in 1951, to the CIA–MI6-backed coup of 19 August 1953.
Seventy-three years later, the consequences of that intervention still echo through relations between Iran and the West.
This is a story of oil, empire, democracy and power — and of what happened when Iran tried to take control of its most valuable resources
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