The Raw Story

Monday, 23 March 2015

Oligarch infighting: Kolomoisky given 24 hours to disarm his private army after storming gas giant's HQ

The Ukrainian government has given the private army of billionaire Dnepropetrovsk governor Igor Kolomoysky a day to lay down their weapons, after they occupied and erected a fence around the headquarters of the national oil company.

"We won't have armed personal security forces of businessmen and politicians on the streets of our cities. This applies to every single one of them," Interior Minister Arsen Avakov said on his Facebook page.

"All security forces have 24 hours to comply with the letter of the law."

President Petro Poroshenko has also dispatched two battalions of the elite National Guard to Dnepropetrovsk, to diffuse "rising tension in the region."

"There will be no more pocket armies for each governor. Any regional armed forces must fall in with the national military hierarchy," the president warned.

Arriving in unmarked armored trucks, dozens of camouflaged men barricaded themselves in the head office of majority state-owned oil producer Ukrnafta in central Kiev on Sunday afternoon. Kolomoysky, whose net worth is estimated at $1.3 billion by Forbes but may be much greater, according to local sources, was inside, issuing orders to build an impromptu barrier around the office. The government says no permit has been issued to allow this.

Kolomoysky's companies own about 43 percent of Ukrnafta, and the government controls just over half the shares. According to previous legislation, the state needed 60 percent ownership to exercise active control over a part-private company, which meant that Kolomoysky could treat Ukrnafta as his own property, including withholding dividends from the state, and sabotaging quorums at board meetings. The conflict erupted after the Rada passed a law on Thursday, stipulating that the state could manage any company in which it had a majority share.

Kolomoysky has taken the news badly. After the government fired his protégé from Ukrtransnafta - another energy company in which he has a stake, but a transporter, not a producer - Kolomoysky also occupied its office on Friday. Accusing the government of being "Russian saboteurs" and "corporate raiders" in an expletive-filled rant to the media, he reportedly threatened to "bring 2,000 volunteer fighters to Kiev," before being persuaded to stand down.

He also allegedly temporarily froze bank accounts owned by companies affiliated with Petro Poroshenko, himself an oligarch.

From key ally to potential suspect

Until the recent fallout, the oligarch, who additionally holds Israeli and Cypriot citizenships, was considered one of Kiev's most effective allies. As well as espousing strongly nationalist rhetoric, Kolomoysky has funded several large units fighting against the rebel forces in the east of the country.

But taking on the entire state apparatus may cost the oligarch more than just financial influence.

On Monday, Valentin Nalivaichenko, the head of Ukraine's security service, the SBU, directly accused the Dnepropetrovsk authorities of "financing criminal gangs."

These have been operating near the eastern conflict zones.

"A single criminal gang has been carrying out kidnappings, murders and violence against officials in Donetsk and Dnepropetrovsk. That gang has been in contact, and even received financing from Dnepropetrovsk officials," he said during a press conference in Kiev.

"Those officials are now intimidating our investigators by threatening to use illegal armed units against them in the region," said Nalivaichenko, specifically naming the threat posed by 'Sich', the very same "security firm" that has occupied the Ukrnafta head office in Kiev.

Four of Kolomoysky's allies in the Rada said on Monday that they were quitting Poroshenko's bloc, and called for a demonstration in Dnepropetrovsk, to demonstrate support for the embattled oil baron.

The Harper government's pursuit of its odious Secret Police Act (C51) is just another chapter in the most through-going, and massive social engineering project in the history of the country. Social engineering used to be one of the favourite phrases of the right in its attack on social programs - accusing both liberal-minded politicians and meddling bureaucrats with manufacturing the welfare state. They conveniently ignored the fact that there was huge popular demand and support for activist government.

That was the so-called golden age of capitalism and it wasn't just because of expanding government services. It was so-called because of a much broader and well-informed citizen engagement - both through social movements and as individual citizens. The level of trust in government was much higher than it is today. And absent from the picture were the factors that today dominate the political conversation: fear and economic insecurity.

Exactly how historians will describe this period in Canadian history is anyone's guess but one approach could be to look upon the Harper era as an experiment in revealing how vulnerable democracies are to political sociopaths bold enough and ruthless enough to bend or break every rule and tradition on which democracy's foundation rests.

It's not just the institutions that are vulnerable though they certainly are. It's a familiar list including Harper's bullying of Governor General Michaelle Jean to force the proroguing of the House, his guide book on how to make parliamentary committees ineffective, the use of robo-calls and other election dirty tricks, his attempt to break the rules in appointing a Supreme Court Judge and his neutering the House of Commons question period through a deliberate strategy of refusing to answer questions - a practice that institutionalizes a contempt for Parliament that spreads outward to the general public. At a certain point it doesn't matter who is responsible - the institution itself becomes risible and irrelevant to ordinary citizens. Which is, of course, exactly what Harper intends.

And that brings us to the other element of democratic politics - the actual citizens who are supposed to be the raw material of democracy. The whole institutional edifice theoretically rests on the foundation of the voting public. The extent to which the institutions of democracy can be assaulted and eroded with impunity is directly proportional to the level of civic literacy. The lower it is, the easier it is for malevolent autocrats like Harper to abuse his power.

In terms of civic literacy we are somewhere between Europe where it is relatively high and the US where it is frighteningly low. While the question is obviously more complicated than this, it's not far-fetched to suggest that there is a continuum - with consumerism at one end and highly engaged citizenship at the other. We live in a hyper-consumer society - not a citizen-society characterized by the oft-repeated disclaimer "I'm not interested in politics." The growing basis for our culture is not community or cooperation but conspicuous consumption and possessive individualism.

So long as the political elite accepted the basic premises of modern democracy and activist government, so long as the institutions they controlled functioned more or less within their defined mandates (that is, they were only occasionally abused) society could function with a minimal level of civic literacy. We could all go shopping more or less assured that the stuff of government (in substance and process) would continue undisturbed. If all political parties accepted the precepts of civil liberties, for example, it didn't matter that much if there was a low degree of public awareness of the importance of civil liberties to our daily lives.

But when a politician suddenly appears on the scene willing to systematically violate democratic principles as if they simply don't apply to him, then the demand for increased civic literacy is just as suddenly urgent and critical. Yet it is not something can be accomplished easily or quickly. Three sources come to mind: schools, the media and civil society organizations and activity.

Despite the best efforts of teachers and their unions over the decades civic literacy is extremely low on the curriculum totem pole in Canadian schools. Provincial governments have resisted such pressures which should hardly come as a surprise. There is a built in bias in a hierarchical, capitalist society against critical thinking - precisely because in liberal democracies the over-arching role of government is to manage capitalism with a view to maintaining it along with all its inherent inequalities. Too many critical thinkers is not helpful.

The media, of course, are largely responsible for helping put Stephen Harper in power. Ever since the Machiavellian Conrad Black bought up most of Canada's dailies they have been used (by him and his successors) as an explicit propaganda tool for the dismantling of the post-war democratic consensus. While there are some tentative signs that they now recognize they've created a monster (Globe editorials criticizing the PM on a number of issues like C51) it's a little late. Twenty-five years of telling people there is no alternative to unfettered capitalism has had a pernicious effect on both democracy and civic literacy.

That leaves voluntary (for the most part) civil society organizations. Yet, despite their objective of informing people about the myriad issues we face, here, too, the model falls short of significantly expanding the base of engaged, informed citizens. Ironically, much of the defensive politics of the left are the mirror image of Harper's reliance on fear (of Muslims, criminals, niqabs, terrorists, environmentalists, unions, the CBC) to energize his base. We peddle more mundane but substantive fears - of losing Medicare, of climate change, of higher tuition fees, of unprotected rivers and streams and dirty oil.

If Canadians are scared silly, it's no wonder given the mode of politics directed at them.

Regrettably there is no model from Canadian history that points us in the direction of serious commitment to civic literacy. We have to look to the Scandinavian countries. According to Canadian author Henry Milner ,"Swedish prime minister Olof Palme once said that he preferred to think of Sweden not as a social democracy but as a 'study-circle democracy.' The idea ...is associated most of all with the efforts of the ABF (the Workers' Educational Association). ...The ABF offers courses in organizing groups and co-operatives, understanding media, and a broad range of contemporary issues, as well as languages, computers, art, music, and nature appreciation." There were ten other groups doing study circles - many of them subsidized by the government. Half of all Swedish adults were involved in them

Even in Sweden the model is no longer as robust as it was when Milner wrote this assessment (2002). But even after the defeat of Social Democratic governments, no party has dared undermine Swedish social programs or run roughshod over its democracy. That's because informed citizens are not easily manipulated by fear and their level of trust in government remains high.

Given our shamefully biased media Canadians still manage to resist Harper's continued assault on our political sensibility. The first polls on the Secret Police Act (don't call it by any other name) were alarming with upwards of 80% agreeing with the need for tougher anti-terror laws. But things are changing very quickly as the result of a determined fight-back by civil society groups, a phalanx of heavy-hitting experts and the NDP. A Forum Research poll this week showed support for the Act was down to 38% with those disapproving at 51% - an amazing turn around. The highest levels of disapproval were amongst "...the youngest (64%), New Democrats (77%), the best educated (65%) and the non-religious (70%)."

Yet the Forum results are decidedly mixed and demonstrate how much work there is yet to be done to neutralize the fear campaign. When respondents were presented with specific parts of the bill the percentage disapproving actually decreased and supporters increased.

The polling will no doubt continue to demonstrate confusion, a desire to deal with the real problem of terrorism and condemnation of the attempt to at the idea of labelling environmentalists and First Nations as terror suspects.

Yet a huge effort will be needed to completely immunize Canadians against the next wave of Harper fear-mongering. Imagine if all these efforts and similar warning campaigns had instead been put into creating something similar to the Swedish "study circle democracy." That's the only lasting solution to voter manipulation and a healthy democracy. Until we realize that, progressive politics will remain crisis management and we will continue to pin our desperate hopes on coalitions and proportional representation. But without a high degree of civic literacy these institutional fixes will be ultimately dissatisfying.

Kiev said it will stop importing Russian gas from next Wednesday if Gazprom doesn't offer it a better price, according to the country's Energy Minister Vladimir Demchishin. Halting supplies through Ukraine could put Europe's energy security in limbo.

"It is necessary to buy Russian gas at the moment, but buying at a higher price than we can buy from Europe makes no sense," Demchishin said Monday, as quoted by TASS.

Similar claims have been made by Prime Minister Arseny Yatsenyuk.

Last week, Ukraine Finance Minister Natalia Yaresko said gas imports from the EU would be $50 cheaper per 1,000 cubic meters.

Russian Energy Minister Aleksandr Novak said the price Ukraine would pay for gas starting April 1 could be $348, according to preliminary calculations. Under the current 'winter plan' Russia sells gas to Ukraine at $378 per 1,000 cubic meters, but it only after receiving prepayment from Kiev.

Moscow and Kiev are expected to strike a new gas deal this week, since the 'winter plan' expires at the end of March. Ukraine expects to sign a new deal with Russian on April 13-14, according to Demchishin. At a previous meeting, Ukraine agreed to continue buying Russian gas to keeps its underground storage full in order to ensure supplies to Europe.

As of Sunday, Ukraine's gas reserves stood at 7.741 billion cubic meters, 5 percent less than on the first of the month, according to data from Gas Storage Europe (GSE). Since the beginning of the year, Ukraine's gas reserves have shrunk by 3.627 billion cubic meters, TASS reports.

Deliveries of Russian gas to Ukraine in 2014 were suspended for almost six months. On June 16 Gazprom switched to a prepayment system for Naftogaz because of a $4.5 billion debt, and only resumed deliveries on December 9.

Not only does touch seem to signal trust and cooperation, it creates them. Our sense of touch does much more than help us navigate the world at our fingertips. It is becoming clear that touching each other plays a fundamental role in our lives. It isn't just a sentimental human indulgence, says Francis McGlone at Liverpool John Moores University, UK. "It is a biological necessity."

Touching gives the world an emotional context. It builds trust and promotes teamwork, wins friends and influences people. But that's not all. Beginning in the womb, it may guide the development of regions in our brain that govern social behaviour. It could even give us our sense of self. The touch of others makes us who we are.

Compared to the other senses, however, touch often gets a raw deal. It receives less attention than sight or hearing, say. And yet the skin -- our touch detector -- is our biggest organ. An average-sized man has some 5 or 6 kilograms of it -- roughly the weight of a bowling ball. As well as regulating our temperature and shielding us from infection and injury, our skin is a communication interface with the outside world. And just as we can lose our sight or hearing, we can go touch-blind.

The Touch Research Institute at the University of Miami School of Medicine says it has carried out more than 100 studies into touch and found evidence of significant effects, including faster growth in premature babies, reduced pain, decreased autoimmune disease symptoms, lowered glucose levels in children with diabetes, and improved immune systems in people with cancer.

The nerves that carry signals from the surface of our skin to the brain run at different speeds. In the fast lane, we have A fibres, heavy duty cables that carry breaking news to the brain in an instant -- detailed information that helps us safely navigate our environment. In the slow lane, however, we have C fibres, thinner wires that deliver messages at a more languid pace. Moving at a sedate 7 kilometres an hour, information carried by one of these nerves takes about a second to travel from a caressed ankle up to the brain.

Our high-speed nervous system is relatively well understood. For years, we also thought the vocabulary of our skin was limited to messages of pressure or vibration, temperature, itches and pain. The slower C fibres were just thought to convey the less immediate components of pain -- throbs and aches, rather than pricks, stings and burns. But in the late 1990s, researchers identified a type of C fibre in humans -- dubbed C-tactile fibres or CT fibres -- that seemed to be activated by soft caresses.

People can communicate several distinct emotions through touch alone, including anger, fear, disgust, love, gratitude, and sympathy. Accuracy rates ranged from 48 per cent to 83 per cent, comparable with those found in studies of emotions shown in faces and voices. "The evidence indicates that humans can communicate several distinct emotions through touch," said Dr Hertenstein. "Our study is the first to provide rigorous evidence showing that humans can reliably signal love, gratitude and sympathy with touch. These findings raise the interesting possibility that touch may convey more positive emotions than the face.''

Most touch receptors are concentrated in places like the lips and fingertips. However, CT fibres are found only on hairy skin -- almost everywhere except the lips, palms of the hands and soles of the feet -- and are concentrated on the top of the head, upper torso, arms and thighs. Like other touch highways, CT fibres are wired up to the brain region that lets us construct a model of the physical world around us -- the somatosensory cortex. But they also plug into areas like the insular cortex, which is linked to emotions.

Touch helps to build trust

"CT fibres activate this whole network of brain regions involved in thinking about other people and trying to understand what their intentions might be," says Kevin Pelphrey of Yale University. These same regions also respond to other social cues, such as facial expressions. "We think this touch system is another way to communicate social intentions," he says.

Or as David Linden -- a neuroscientist at Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore, Maryland, and author of new book -- puts it: fast fibres are all about the facts, slow ones the emotional vibe.

What's more, they seem to be primed to the touch of others. "These nerve fibres respond optimally to low force, low velocity, stroking movements of around 3 to 5 centimetres per second," says McGlone. In other words, a gentle stroke. This kind of touch -- variously called social, emotional or affective touch -- also seems to be activated more by warm temperatures , meaning a touch from cold hands is less rewarding. "They are exquisitely tuned to exactly the type of affiliative touching that you see between parents and baby, or between two lovers," says McGlone.

But what for? It is probably to do with social bonding, if clues from our primate cousins are anything to go by. Robin Dunbar of the University of Oxford and his colleagues at Aalto University in Helsinki, Finland, have preliminary results suggesting that gentle stroking activates similar brain pathways in humans to those that fire in non-human primates such as rhesus macaques during a grooming session. It also triggers the same release of endorphins. Interestingly, in humans, the density of an individual's endorphin receptors seems to correspond with the size of their social network.

Since gentle touching is rewarding, Dunbar thinks it encourages individuals to spend time together to develop relationships of trust and obligation. "We probably have as much physical contact within our core relationships as monkeys do within theirs," he says.

Touch lets us communicate a range of emotions. Gratitude, sympathy and love can all be conveyed with the briefest of touches. "I have always argued that touch is worth a thousand words in terms of understanding how somebody really sees you," says Dunbar.

Setting Boundaries

"The psychological sense of being oneself seems to be linked to being touched in this emotional way by another person," she says. "This may have a crucial role in teaching us the psychological boundaries of our own body, what is mine and what is not." Fotopoulou also has new results suggesting that people who have had a stroke can recover a lost sense of limb ownership if the arm or leg is stroked on a regular basis.

One question that fascinates many researchers is when this sense of identity develops. It might be that a parent's touch teaches infants about where they stop and others begin. "We aren't born with a fully fledged sense of body and self, and so we believe that what parents do is important for building it," says Fotopoulou.

Our sense of touch kicks in early. It is the first sense to develop, starting about eight weeks after conception, when the fetus is 1.5 centimetres long and brain activity is just beginning. "We know that babies are learning a great deal about touch in the uterus," says Tiffany Field, director of the Touch Research Institute at the University of Miami School of Medicine in Florida. "They suck on their thumbs, grab the umbilical cord and are constantly bumping against the walls of the mother's abdomen."

Emotional touch may also be at work in the womb. McGlone thinks that the swirl of amniotic fluid around the downy, lanugo hairs that cover a fetus may provide crucial stimulation to a developing brain, guiding the construction of areas such as the insular cortex. For McGlone, such caresses provide a kind of scaffold for the "social" parts of the brain, promoting the growth of synapses and connecting networks in key areas. And this building work continues after birth.

Ongoing stimulation is crucial for the development of other sensory systems, such as vision. If you deliberately block vision in one eye soon after birth, for example, the parts of the brain that process vision from that eye will never develop, even if it is unblocked later on.

"My hunch is that the natural interaction between parents and the infant -- that continuous desire to touch, cuddle and handle -- is providing the essential inputs that lay the foundations for a well-adjusted social brain," says McGlone. "It's more than just nice, it's absolutely critical."

Losing touch

We can lose our sense of touch in a number of ways. When Ian Waterman was 19, his immune system attacked his nerves and he lost his sense of proprioception -- a kind of internal touch that helps us locate our body in space. He could still feel pain and temperature, and his motor nervous system still functioned. But without knowing where his limbs were unless he looked, he couldn't move. It took years of mental retraining to learn how to will his arms and legs into action.

Other cases have been reported in which people lose the ability to feel prods and pokes, with similarly debilitating results. There is also a community of people in Norrbotten, Sweden, who have a genetic condition that makes them largely insensitive to pain.

Touch at a distance

Touch is a fundamental part of human communication, but in this era of remote digital interaction are we missing out? Some obviously think so, because there are now devices that can help us connect with colleagues or loved-ones remotely.

One gadget on the market is the Hug Shirt. By donning a sensor-laden sweater, you can record a cuddle by giving yourself a hug. This is then sent to a shirt worn by a recipient, which recreates the strength, duration and shape of your embrace. Other devices in development include objects that send strokes and squeezes over the internet by making companion devices respond with vibrations and temperature changes.

Can remote touches replace the real thing? Maybe. Michiel Spape at the Helsinki Institute for Information Technology in Finland and his colleagues recently invited volunteers to play a game of trust called Ultimatum remotely. In the game, two players must decide how to divide a sum of money. One is asked how the money should be split, the other accepts or rejects the proposal. If an agreement is reached, both players receive their share; if not, neither gets anything.

Being touched by someone often makes us feel more altruistic towards them, so Spape's team strapped a vibrating "tactor" to the players' hands to recreate the sense of being touched. This made it slightly more likely that players would agree when divvying up their spoils.

Hug actually affect the entire body to such an extent that many scientists claim it is equivalent to the effect of many different drugs operating on the body simultaneously. Even seemingly trivial instances of interpersonal touch can help people deal with their emotions with clarity and more effectively.

How hugs can heal

* Hugging your partner could lower his or her blood pressure.

* Researchers have found that in younger women, the more hugs they get, the lower their blood pressure.

* Researchers at the University of North Carolina who investigated 69 pre-menopausal women showed that those who had the most hugs had a reduced heart rate.

* Exactly what could be responsible is not clear, but the psychiatrists who carried out the work also found that blood levels of the hormone oxytocin were much higher in the women who were hugged the most.

* Other research finds that oxytocin is released during social contact and that it is associated with social bonding, while a study at Ohio State University shows that when it is put into wounds in animals, the injuries heal much more quickly.

* Work at the Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences suggests that oxytocin can induce anti-stress-like effects, including reduction in blood pressure and levels of the stress hormone cortisol: "It increases pain thresholds and stimulates various types of positive social interaction, and it promotes growth and healing. Oxytocin can be released by various types of non-noxious sensory stimulation, for example by touch and warmth," they say.

Sources:

ncbi.nlm.nih.gov

huffingtonpost.com

newscientist.com

ncbi.nlm.nih.gov

dailymail.co.uk

The 1953 coup remains a topic of global interest because so much about it is still under intense debate. Even fundamental questions — who hatched the plot, who ultimately carried it out, who supported it inside Iran, and how did it succeed — are in dispute.[1]

The issue is more than academic. Political partisans on all sides, including the Iranian government, regularly invoke the coup to argue whether Iran or foreign powers are primarily responsible for the country's historical trajectory, whether the United States can be trusted to respect Iran's sovereignty, or whether Washington needs to apologize for its prior interference before better relations can occur.

© Ali Rahnem

This map shows the disposition of bands of "ruffians," paid to demonstrate by coup organizers, early on August 19, 1953. The bands gathered in the bazaar and other sections of southern Tehran, then moved north through the capital. Thug leaders' names appear at left, along with the estimated size of their groups, and their targets.

© Ali Rahnema

Pro-Shah police, military units and undercover agents became engaged in the coup starting mid-morning August 19

Also, the public release of these materials is noteworthy because CIA documents about 1953 are rare. First of all, agency officials have stated that most of the records on the coup were either lost or destroyed in the early 1960s, allegedly because the record-holders' "safes were too full."[2]

Regarding public access to any remaining files (reportedly about one cubic foot of material), the intelligence community's standard procedure for decades has been to assert a blanket denial. This is in spite of commitments made two decades ago by three separate CIA directors. Robert M. Gates, R. James Woolsey, and John M. Deutch each vowed to open up agency historical files on a number of Cold War-era covert operations, including Iran, as a sign of the CIA's purported new policy of openness after the collapse of the USSR in 1991.[3]

© Ali Rahnema

Tanks played a critical role on August 19, with pro-Shah forces gaining control of some 24 of them from the military during the course of the day

A clear sign that their pledge would not be honored in practice came after the National Security Archive filed a lawsuit in 1999 for a well-known internal CIA narrative about the coup. One of the operation's planners, Donald N. Wilber, prepared the account less than a year later. The CIA agreed to release just a single sentence out of the 200-page report.

Despite the appearance of countless published accounts about the operation over the years - including Kermit Roosevelt's own detailed memoir, and the subsequent leak to The New York Times of the 200-page CIA narrative history[4] — intelligence agencies typically refused to budge. They have insisted on making a distinction between publicly available information on U.S. activities from non-government sources and official acknowledgement of those activities, even several decades after the fact.

© Ali Rahnema

Anti-Mosaddeq armed forces converged on his house (left side of map) beginning around 4:00 pm, eventually forcing him to escape over a garden wall before his house was destroyed. By then, Zahedi had already addressed the nation from the Radio Transmission Station.

While the National Security Archive applauds the CIA's decision to make these materials available, today's posting shows clearly that these materials could have been safely declassified many years ago without risk of damage to the national security. (See sidebar, "Why is the Coup Still a Secret?")

Archive Deputy Director Malcolm Byrne called for the U.S. intelligence community to make fully available the remaining records on the coup period. "There is no longer good reason to keep secrets about such a critical episode in our recent past. The basic facts are widely known to every school child in Iran. Suppressing the details only distorts the history, and feeds into myth-making on all sides."

To supplement the recent CIA release, the National Security Archive is including two other, previously available internal accounts of the coup. One is the narrative referred to above: a 1954 Clandestine Services History prepared by Donald N. Wilber, one of the operation's chief architects, which The New York Times obtained by a leak and first posted on its site in April 2000.

The other item is a heavily excised 1998 piece — "Zendebad, Shah!" — by an in-house CIA historian. (The Archive has asked the CIA to re-review the document's excessive deletions for future release.)

The posting also features an earlier declassification of The Battle for Iran for purposes of comparison with the latest release. The earlier version includes portions that were withheld in the later release. As often happens, government classification officials had quite different — sometimes seemingly arbitrary — views about what could and could not be safely made public.

Read together, the three histories offer fascinating variations in perspective — from an agency operative to two in-house historians (the last being the most dispassionate). Unfortunately, they still leave wide gaps in the history, including on some fundamental questions which may never be satisfactorily answered — such as how to apportion responsibility for planning and carrying out the coup among all the Iranian and outside actors involved.

But all 21 of the CIA items posted today (in addition to 14 previously unpublished British documents — see Sidebar), reinforce the conclusion that the United States, and the CIA in particular, devoted extensive resources and high-level policy attention toward bringing about Mosaddeq's overthrow, and smoothing over the aftermath.

DOCUMENTS

CIA Records

CIA Internal Histories

Document 1 (Cover Sheet, Summary, I, II, III, IV, V, VI, VII, VIII, IX, X, Appendix A, Appendix B, Appendix C, Appendix D, Appendix E): CIA, Clandestine Services History, Overthrow of Premier Mossadeq of Iran: November 1952 - August 1953, Dr. Donald N. Wilber, March 1954

Source: The New York Times

Donald Wilber was a principal planner of the initial joint U.S.-U.K. coup attempt of August 1953. This 200-page account is one of the most valuable remaining records describing the event because Wilber wrote it within months of the overthrow and provided a great deal of detail. Like any historical document, it must be read with care, taking into account the author's personal perspective, purpose in writing it, and audience. The CIA routinely prepared histories of important operations for use by future operatives. They were not intended to be made public.

Document 2: CIA, Summary, "Campaign to Install a Pro-Western Government in Iran," draft of internal history of the coup, undated