Yeah Mossadegh wanted to STEAL the oil infrastructure that western companies had spent BILLIONS of pounds and dollars building. Just like Chavez actually did in Venezuela and Ghaddafi did in Libya. The Shah was actually a pretty enlightened ruler by Middle Eastern standards, and his secret police were far less brutal than the Mullah's secret police are.
And I always laugh when people try to classify what had happened there as a "Coup".
The leader of Iran before, during and after the era of Mohammed Mosaddegh was always Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi.
He was the Prime Minister, not the ruler of the nation. And he was also a contentious leader even at the time, more or less appointed much like Hitler was. He was threatening mob riots if he was not appointed as Prime Minister, even though he was a member of the minority party.
And he was not overthrown in any kind of coup, the Shah always had the power to appoint and dismiss his Prime Minister. And although rare, that has long been the power of monarchs. The last time it was used in the UK for example was in 1834 when King William IV dismissed William Lamb over accusations he was radicalizing the Whig party.
But yes, one of the key reasons why the Shah fired Mohammed Mosaddegh was he was trying to force the Shah to abdicate and nationalize the oil. Unlike Venezuela, he realized that Iran did not have the capability to drill, transport or distil their own oil. And even attempting to nationalize it would have looked great in the short term, but crippled them in the long term as they did not have the capability to replace the Western companies that had actually invested the money and resources.
It would be more or less like the Venezuela communications system today. Hopelessly backwards and outdated, as no company is willing to step up and invest the money required to modernize the system now in place without hard cash up front. Because AT&T and other companies invested hundreds of millions of dollars in the system in the 1980s and 1990s, and never saw that investment paid back.
Oh, somebody may will upgrade them to at least the "Early Broadband" era if infrastructure, but only on a COD arrangement. No more infrastructure to Venezuela under the "install now pay later" agreements.
