British Diplomatic Oil Crisis: Contemporary Anglo-Saxon Geopolitical Rivalries in the Persian Gulf: Drawing a Lesson? Or Sir Anthony Eden‘s Delusion of Grandeur.

The
American Ambassador to Teheran, Loy Henderson, had an interview
on 10th November with the Iranian Prime Minister, Dr. Musaddiq. The
Iranian Prime Minister suggested to the United States Ambassador
that US companies should start purchasing Iranian oil, and the US
Government should provide a loan of $100,000,000. In a statement the
State Department, on 7th December 1952, expressed the US
Government’s reluctance in interfering with any American oil company
which wanted to buy oil from Iran. Anthony Eden, the British Foreign
Secretary in a statement in the House of Commons, on 8th December,
announced that ‘Her Majesty’s Government continue to regard the
products of the oil industry in South Persia as the property of the
Anglo-Iranian Oil Company.’ 57 There was a
high degree of pressure by independent American oil companies on the
American Government, concerning the issue of buying oil from Iran.
The American position was becoming increasingly weak. To prevent any
additional pressure on the United States’ stand from the oil
companies until the taking over of the Eisenhower’s Republican
administration in January 1953, a new set of proposals was drafted
by Dean Acheson. The proposals put forward by Acheson were that the
International Bank, together with a group of major American
companies, would pay a sum to the Anglo-Iranian Oil Company, in
order to settle all of its claims. Then the American oil companies,
in conjunction with the National Iranian Oil Company, would form a
Perso-American Company in order to get the oil refinery in Abadan
working again and resume oil production. The United States companies
would take up the oil, and the Anglo-Iranian Oil Company would be
allowed to buy oil on a long-term basis. The loan from the
International Bank and the oil cartel would be repaid in ten annual
instalments. 58