The Allied Occupation of Iran and Iraq in World War II – Part 2

To attend this webinar please register in advance by using this link. After registering you will be sent joining details. The webinar is open to non-members.

This lecture follows on from the talk given by Professor Ashley Jackson on 9th November and will take up the story from the beginning of the occupation of Iran in 1941.

The occupation of neutral Iran was to open a supply route to support the Soviets against the German invasion of the USSR which, but for the defence of Stalingrad, would have led to the capture of the oilfields of Iran and Iraq, on which the UK depended.

The operation was a logistical triumph, involving building new docks, extending the railway network, importing rolling stock and locomotives, assembling aircraft at the dockside, as well as building hundreds of miles of roads and importing thousands of trucks, which all gave employment to thousands of Iranians. After the victories of Stalingrad and Alamein, the German threat to the east evaporated and most of the British and American troops were withdrawn to fight in Italy. The operation was thereafter forgotten, at least in England, as a sideshow.

The military memoirs of the time supply the detail of the operations on the ground which, since there was very little resistance, lacked military excitement. What Professor Jackson has achieved in his book is to paint a much broader picture, including Iraq, that shows the strategic drama created by Rashid Ali and the mufti of Jerusalem in Iraq, combined with the earlier threat to the oilfields of Iran and Iraq posed by the Soviets, who were then in pact with Germany. This was at a time when it looked as though Egypt might be lost and the Allies had precious few troops or equipment to spare.

Professor Jackson is Professor of Imperial and Military History at King’s College London and a Visiting Fellow at Kellogg College, Oxford. He is a Fellow of the Royal Historical Society and a Fellow of the Higher Education Academy. He has published widely on aspects of British imperial history, with a special interest in the Empire during times of war and with regional specialisms in the history of Africa, the Indian Ocean, and the Middle East.