استقلال سیاسی در دوره رضاشاه

in The Allies began to issue warnings to the informal and private contacts, but later in formal and public notes-that, unless the activities of the German agents in Iran were curtailed, they would take a very serious view of the situation. This referred to the presence of several hundred German technical and military advisers in Iran, some of whom are bound to have been undercover agents for various German intelligence services. The Iranian response was, for some time, cool and dismissive, merely reassuring the Allies of their own neutrality, and the harmlessness of the German nationals. However, in the summer of 1941, it became clear that the Allies were intent on taking a tough line with the Shah and his servile government. It is typical of absolute and arbitrary despots that they begin to feel the gravity of a serious situation too late to be able to manoeuvre themselves out of it; for they are victims of a belief in their own invincibility, and of flattering misinformation from their servants. At the eleventh hour, some radical steps were taken in the hope of forestalling an Allied invasion of Iran. But it was too close to the high noon, the Allied forces entered Iran on 25 August 1941. Reza Shah took the foolish step of ordering a general mobilisation, which was followed by a few days of resistance by the "Imperial armed forces'. This exposed the complete hollowness of the glorious Iranian army-the costs of whose existence and extra-legal powers had been borne by the Iranian people and quickly led to its demoralisation and disorderly retreat. Senior officers are reported to have escaped by wearing the hitherto forbidden women's 'veil', though this may be just a caricature of the truth about the army, the most cherished product of the 'Redeemer of Persia, the Architect of Modern Iran' His Most Powerful Majesty abdicated and was taken abroad a British vessel to Mauritius, and later to Johannesburg, where he died probably of depression in 1944.

Homa katouzian