War Time Memories
From the diaries of Fereydoun Hoveyda

Tehran 1945: Iran's Foreign Policy went on at the Ministry of Justice
Left to right foreground - Anoshiravan Sepahbody and Ghavam Saltaneh

In 1944, Anoshiravan Sepahbody who was Iran’s Ambassador to Turkey, returned home while World War II was still raging on.  In those days, with the abdication of Reza Shah and the occupation of our then neutral country by three invading foreign armies, Iran’s internal politics constituted a highly risky business. While in Ankara and following the abdication of Reza Shah, Sepahbody had bluntly refused the suggestion of the British Ambassador to remove the large portrait of Reza Shah that still adorned the reception room of our embassy. Most important of all, from Ankara Ambassador Sepahbody had dispatched to Tehran a report that could have well prevented Iran's invasion during World War II.
It was a time when the sweeping victories of the Red army on the Eastern front boosted the Iranian communists and disquieted the British who dominated the southern oil fields. The Americans, despite President Roosevelt’s special relations with Marshal Stalin, were aware of and opposed to Russian backed separatist movements in Iranian Azerbaijan and Kurdistan. The Iranian parliament and government were walking on a tight rope, trying to keep up a delicate balance between all the pressures by the three Allied powers who, upon entering the country had signed a treaty with Tehran, guaranteeing the independence and territorial integrity of the country. Actually, following this treaty Iran had declared war on Germany and Japan. In order not to cave in to pressures, Iranian governments would resign one after the other after a few months in power. I remember that two or three more or less older politicians would succeed each other as in a merry go round:

Saed , Sadrol Achraf, Hakim-ol-Molk and so forth . In 1945, as the end of war in Europe closed in, Iran faced two problems: The Russians insisted on obtaining an oil concession in the northern provinces around the Caspian sea while the Americans and British wanted Iran to pay for all the materials their departing armies would were living behind (Indeed the arms, tents, vehicles and other stuff were not worth the cost of transport back home.) In one of the short-lived cabinets (headed, if I am not mistaken by the octogenarian Hakim-ol-Molk ) Anoshiravan Sepahbody was chosen as Foreign minister . During the presentation of the cabinet to the monarch , the young Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi, shaking hands with Sepahbody remarked : "At long last a good diplomat in the right place! ". Indeed he knew Sepahbody from his student days in Switzerland (where Sepahbody was Ambassador both to the Helvetic Confederation and the League of Nations). Actually, the Prime minister had thought to chose a "technocrat" rather than a politician to the post in order to avoid taking sides between the three challenging Allied powers .

But Sepahbody was a patriot before being a "technician". During all his career he had fiercely defended Iran’s national interests . As a diplomat he knew that he had to act firmly toward foreign ambassadors. One day in the late spring of 1945, the American ambassador called the Foreign ministry on a Friday ( Iranian "Sunday") insisting that Sepahbody comes immediately to the office to receive him . Sepahbody’s secretary called his boss who asked the object of the ambassador’s visit. As it happened the ambassador wanted to discuss with the Foreign Minister ways of accelerating the contract of sale of American’s army "worthless leftovers".

Sepahbody told his secretary to inform the ambassador that this matter lacked such urgency as to necessitate discussions on the weekly holiday. "Tell the ambassador’s secretary that I will receive him tomorrow at 9.30 AM". The next day the ambassador contacted the Prime minister’s office and filed a protest against the "anti-American" attitude of the Foreign Minister! Actually, Sepahbody was personally opposed to the deal: he considered that the "odds and ends" were junk and not worth the many million of dollars billed by the U.S. army. If thought that instead the US should pay Iran for the extensive use and wear and tear of the Trans-Iranian Railways  to ship goods and war materials to the Soviet Union. It is in this conext that in order to accommodate the US State Department, Sepahbody was prevented from heading the Iranian Delegation to the San Francisco Conference that created the United Nations.

Later on, with the change of cabinet he was stripped from the foreign ministry altogether and the new minister signed the agreement of sale of the American army’s "leftovers". In the meantime the communists, under Soviet cover, proclaimed independent republics in Azerbaijan and Kurdistan and Moscow refused to withdraw its troops according to the treaty signed by the Allies with Iran . The international crisis that followed marked the start of the Cold War. Politicians in Parliament thought that the country needed a "strong" Prime Minister to conduct negotiations with Stalin and convince him to pull out the Red army. They called on a former politician Ghavam-Saltaneh . The latter wanted Sepahbody because of his reputation as a staunchly independent and nationalist following the incident with the American ambassador . But because of the Iranian reliance on president Truman at the United Nations’ Security Council , he preferred to keep the post of foreign minister to himself and thus nominated Sepahbody as Minister of Justice . However Ghavam privately continued consulting with Sepahbody on foreign policy matters.

In the summer of 1946 Sepahbody, keeping his membership in the cabinet, was sent to Paris to head Iranian Delegation at the Peace Conference. As Ghavam finally convinced Stalin to withdraw his army from Iran, the Shah, decided from then on to take matters in his own hands. He dismissed a skillful Ghavam and instead nominated as Prime minister one of his own entourage. He also ordered Sepahbody to remain in Paris as ambassador to France. A year later, Ghavam who was now under a cloud and ailing, came to Paris for consulting his medical doctors. Sepahbody offered a reception in his honor and a photograph showing him helping the former Prime minister with his overcoat was published in the press. The photo infuriated the Shah who at odds with Ghavam and he recalled Sepahbody to Tehran.

"Tomorrow's fate, though thou be wise,
Thou canst not tell, nor yet surmise:
Pass, therefore, not today in vain,
For it will never come again."
Omar Khayyam
                                                                                                                         Fereydoun Hoveyda, May 2003

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