With Eisenhower’s blessing, Dulles charged ahead in June 1953 with Operation Ajax, a joint undertaking with Britain’s MI6 to overthrow Prime Minister Mohammad Mossadeq of Iran, who was threatening to nationalize oil fields belonging to the British-owned Anglo-Iranian Oil Company (now British Petroleum) and who, it was feared in Washington, was soft on Communism. Kermit “Kim” Roosevelt Jr., Theodore Roosevelt’s grandson, was tasked with returning real power to the Shah of Iran. That is precisely what
