1953 Iranian Coup d'état

The 1953 Iranian coup d'état (Operation Ajax/Boot) was a CIA and MI6-backed operation that overthrew the democratically elected government of Prime Minister Mohammad Mossadegh. On 19 August 1953, royalist officers and mobs organised with covert US and British support seized key installations in Tehran and toppled Mossadegh's cabinet. Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi, who had briefly fled the country, returned to power. Mossadegh was arrested and tried by a military tribunal, receiving a three-year prison sentence before being placed under permanent house arrest. Karim Sanjabi and other National Front leaders were arrested. The coup ended Iran's experiment with democratic governance and the oil nationalisation era, and set the stage for the Shah's authoritarian consolidation, backed by SAVAK, over the following decades.