-PDF Download- First Steps In The Middle East How Concerns About Communism And Orientalist Perceptions Shaped Us Policy Towards Iran In The 1950s EBOOK

First steps in the middle east - how concerns about communism and orientalist perceptions shaped U.S. policy towards Iran in the 1950s

Author: Michael Schmid

Publisher: GRIN Verlag

Published: 2007-04-28

Total Pages: 28

ISBN-13: 363878407X

Seminar paper from the year 2006 in the subject American Studies - Miscellaneous, grade: 1,3, Free University of Berlin (John F. Kennedy Institut), course: Rise to Power: US Foreign Policy in the 20th Century, language: English, abstract: No area seems to be of more importance in the field of foreign policy and diplomatic history today than the so called Middle East. The continuing clashes between Israeli forces and Palestinian suicide bombers, the difficult challenge of stabilizing a newly elected government in Iraq and the growing tension between Iran and the international community concerning the issue of nuclear power are just a few examples which illustrate the urgency to look at origins of these conflicts. As an example for this essay, I have chosen the case of Iran. I will focus on the very beginning of the involvement of the United States in the Middle East, and I will demonstrate what kind of issues and perceptions played an essential role in the determination of U.S. policy towards Iran. Although I do not attempt to find causes for the current situation, some of the factors I will identify in this essay might also serve as an explanation for the current conflict with Iran. Yet, this is not my primary intention and further research and empirical data will be required to investigate connections to the contemporary situation with Iran. However, I will argue that the way US policymakers viewed their Iranian counterparts did not change fundamentally for many decades at least regarding the country of Iran if not more countries in the Middle East. I downplay this aspect because a lot more research is needed to support this argument and it would extend beyond the scope of this essay. Mostly the dealings with Iran and its premier Muhammad Musaddiq in the early 1950s at the time of the Anglo-Iranian oil crises will be of relevance. The essence of my argument is that even though strategic thinking and the fear of a communist takeover of Iran played a role in negotiating with Iran, the reason why Musaddiq was toppled by the CIA and the British MI-6 was because Western diplomats had a so called “orientalist” mindset and perceived him as too weak and irrational as to fight off Soviet attacks and propaganda which could have led to an eventual takeover of Iran by Soviet forces. In order to pre-empt that, the United States and Britain collaborated to bring down Musaddiq and install a shah regime that would, on the one hand be more favourable to Western oil interests, and on the other hand more resistant regarding possible Soviet invasion efforts.

Perceptions of Palestine

Author: Kathleen Christison

Publisher: Univ of California Press

Published: 2023-04-28

Total Pages: 400

ISBN-13: 0520922360

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For most of the twentieth century, considered opinion in the United States regarding Palestine has favored the inherent right of Jews to exist in the Holy Land. That Palestinians, as a native population, could claim the same right has been largely ignored. Kathleen Christison's controversial new book shows how the endurance of such assumptions, along with America's singular focus on Israel and general ignorance of the Palestinian point of view, has impeded a resolution to the Arab-Israeli conflict. Christison begins with the derogatory images of Arabs purveyed by Western travelers to the Middle East in the nineteenth century, including Mark Twain, who wrote that Palestine's inhabitants were "abject beggars by nature, instinct, and education." She demonstrates other elements that have influenced U.S. policymakers: American religious attitudes toward the Holy Land that legitimize the Jewish presence; sympathy for Jews derived from the Holocaust; a sense of cultural identity wherein Israelis are "like us" and Arabs distant aliens. She makes a forceful case that decades of negative portrayals of Palestinians have distorted U.S. policy, making it virtually impossible to promote resolutions based on equality and reciprocity between Palestinians and Israelis. Christison also challenges prevalent media images and emphasizes the importance of terminology: Two examples are the designation of who is a "terrorist" and the imposition of place names (which can pass judgment on ownership). Christison's thoughtful book raises a final disturbing question: If a broader frame of reference on the Palestinian-Israeli conflict had been employed, allowing a less warped public discourse, might not years of warfare have been avoided and steps toward peace achieved much earlier?

The Global Cold War

Author: Odd Arne Westad

Publisher: Cambridge University Press

Published: 2005-10-24

Total Pages: 388

ISBN-13: 0521853648

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The Cold War shaped the world we live in today - its politics, economics, and military affairs. This book shows how the globalization of the Cold War during the last century created the foundations for most of the key conflicts we see today, including the War on Terror. It focuses on how the Third World policies of the two twentieth-century superpowers - the United States and the Soviet Union - gave rise to resentments and resistance that in the end helped topple one superpower and still seriously challenge the other. Ranging from China to Indonesia, Iran, Ethiopia, Angola, Cuba, and Nicaragua, it provides a truly global perspective on the Cold War. And by exploring both the development of interventionist ideologies and the revolutionary movements that confronted interventions, the book links the past with the present in ways that no other major work on the Cold War era has succeeded in doing.

The Cold War

Author: Odd Arne Westad

Publisher: Basic Books

Published: 2017-09-05

Total Pages: 720

ISBN-13: 0465093132

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The definitive history of the Cold War and its impact around the world We tend to think of the Cold War as a bounded conflict: a clash of two superpowers, the United States and the Soviet Union, born out of the ashes of World War II and coming to a dramatic end with the collapse of the Soviet Union. But in this major new work, Bancroft Prize-winning scholar Odd Arne Westad argues that the Cold War must be understood as a global ideological confrontation, with early roots in the Industrial Revolution and ongoing repercussions around the world. In The Cold War, Westad offers a new perspective on a century when great power rivalry and ideological battle transformed every corner of our globe. From Soweto to Hollywood, Hanoi, and Hamburg, young men and women felt they were fighting for the future of the world. The Cold War may have begun on the perimeters of Europe, but it had its deepest reverberations in Asia, Africa, and the Middle East, where nearly every community had to choose sides. And these choices continue to define economies and regimes across the world. Today, many regions are plagued with environmental threats, social divides, and ethnic conflicts that stem from this era. Its ideologies influence China, Russia, and the United States; Iraq and Afghanistan have been destroyed by the faith in purely military solutions that emerged from the Cold War. Stunning in its breadth and revelatory in its perspective, this book expands our understanding of the Cold War both geographically and chronologically, and offers an engaging new history of how today's world was created.

The Coup

Author: Ervand Abrahamian

Publisher: The New Press

Published: 2013-11-05

Total Pages: 201

ISBN-13: 1595588620

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An “absorbing” account of the CIA’s 1953 coup in Iran—essential reading for anyone concerned about Iran’s role in the world today (Harper’s Magazine). In August 1953, the Central Intelligence Agency orchestrated the swift overthrow of Iran’s democratically elected leader and installed Muhammad Reza Shah Pahlavi in his place. When the 1979 Iranian Revolution deposed the shah and replaced his puppet government with a radical Islamic republic under Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, the shift reverberated throughout the Middle East and the world, casting a long, dark shadow over United States-Iran relations that extends to the present day. In this authoritative new history of the coup and its aftermath, noted Iran scholar Ervand Abrahamian uncovers little-known documents that challenge conventional interpretations and sheds new light on how the American role in the coup influenced diplomatic relations between the two countries, past and present. Drawing from the hitherto closed archives of British Petroleum, the Foreign Office, and the US State Department, as well as from Iranian memoirs and published interviews, Abrahamian’s riveting account of this key historical event will change America’s understanding of a crucial turning point in modern United States-Iranian relations. A Choice Outstanding Academic Title “Not only is this book important because of its presentation of history. It is also important because it might be predicting the future.” —Counterpunch “Subtle, lucid, and well-proportioned.” —The Spectator “A valuable corrective to previous work and an important contribution to Iranian history.” —American Historical Review

The Muslim World After 9/11

Author: Angel Rabasa

Publisher: Rand Corporation

Published: 2004-11-17

Total Pages: 566

ISBN-13: 0833037552

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Momentous events since September 11, 2001-Operation Enduring Freedom, the global war on terrorism, and the war in Iraq-have dramatically altered the political environment of the Muslim world. Many of the forces influencing this environment, however, are the products of trends that have been at work for many decades. This book examines the major dynamics that drive changes in the religio-political landscape of the Muslim world-a vast and diverse region that stretches from Western Africa through the Middle East to the Southern Philippines and includes Muslim communities and diasporas throughout the world-and draws the implications of these trends for global security and U.S. and Western interests. It presents a typology of ideological tendencies in the different regions of the Muslim world and identifies the factors that produce religious extremism and violence. It assesses key cleavages along sectarian, ethnic, regional, and national lines and examines how those cleavages generate challenges and opportunities for the United States. Finally, the authors identify possible strategies and political and military options for the United States to pursue in response to changing conditions in this critical and volatile part of the world.

Return to Ruin

Author: Zainab Saleh

Publisher: Stanford University Press

Published: 2020-10-06

Total Pages: 336

ISBN-13: 1503614123

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This volume of exiles’ accounts “[uses] the stories as springboards to discussing Iraqi history, politicization, and diasporic experiences in depth” (International Journal of Middle East Studies). With the U.S. invasion of Iraq, Iraqis abroad, hoping to return one day to a better Iraq, became uncertain exiles. Return to Ruin tells the human story of this exile in the context of decades of U.S. imperial interests in Iraq—from the U.S. backing of the 1963 Ba’th coup and support of Saddam Hussein’s regime in the 1980s, to the 1991 Gulf War and 2003 invasion and occupation. Zainab Saleh shares the experiences of Iraqis she met over fourteen years of fieldwork in Iraqi London—offering stories from an aging communist nostalgic for the streets she marched since childhood, a devout Shi’i dreaming of holy cities and family graves, and newly uprooted immigrants with fresh memories of loss, as well as her own. Focusing on debates among Iraqi exiles about what it means to be an Iraqi after years of displacement, Saleh weaves a narrative that draws attention to a once-dominant, vibrant Iraqi cultural landscape and social and political shifts among the diaspora after decades of authoritarianism, war, and occupation in Iraq. Through it all, this book illuminates how Iraqis continue to fashion a sense of belonging and imagine a future, built on the shards of these shattered memories.

Nationalism in Iran

Author: Richard W. Cottam

Publisher: University of Pittsburgh Pre

Published: 1979-06-15

Total Pages: 385

ISBN-13: 0822974207

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For a brief period in the early 1950s, Iranian nationalism captured the world's attention as, under the leadership of Mohammad Mossadeq, the Iranian National Movement tried to liberate Iran from British imperialism. Regarding nationalism as a major determinant of the attitudes and loyalties of those who embrace it, Cottam analyzes the complex religious, national, and social values at work within Iran and examines, more generally, the turbulence of nationalism in developing states and its perplexing problems for American foreign policy. In a new 40-page chapter, added in 1978, Cottam updated his pioneering study by examining the condition of Iran fifteen years after his first analysis-from its rapid economic growth as an oil producer to Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi's unsuccessful efforts to rouse nationalistic sentiment in his favor.

The Evolution of International Security Studies

Author: Barry Buzan

Publisher: Cambridge University Press

Published: 2009-08-27

Total Pages: 401

ISBN-13: 1139480766

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International Security Studies (ISS) has changed and diversified in many ways since 1945. This book provides the first intellectual history of the development of the subject in that period. It explains how ISS evolved from an initial concern with the strategic consequences of superpower rivalry and nuclear weapons, to its current diversity in which environmental, economic, human and other securities sit alongside military security, and in which approaches ranging from traditional Realist analysis to Feminism and Post-colonialism are in play. It sets out the driving forces that shaped debates in ISS, shows what makes ISS a single conversation across its diversity, and gives an authoritative account of debates on all the main topics within ISS. This is an unparalleled survey of the literature and institutions of ISS that will be an invaluable guide for all students and scholars of ISS, whether traditionalist, 'new agenda' or critical.