Ala al-Saltaneh becomes prime minister of Persia

The British chronology of the war records under 6 June 1917 that Ala al-Saltaneh became prime minister of Persia for the second time, taking over the foreign ministry as well. Persian lists of governments date the start of his term to 15 Khordad 1296 in the Iranian calendar, that is to 5 June. The new cabinet replaced the government of Vosugh od-Dowleh, which had resigned at the end of May. Ahmad Shah entrusted power to one of the oldest Persian politicians, a man who had begun his career as early as the middle of the 19th century.

A diplomat from Baghdad

Mirza Mohammad Ali Khan was the son of the Persian consul-general in Baghdad and, according to the Encyclopaedia Iranica, was born in that city in 1838. Some lists give an earlier date, even 1829, and some Persian biographies name Khoy in Persian Azerbaijan as his birthplace. He spent his whole life in the diplomatic service. For about ten years he was consul-general in Bombay, then in Baghdad and in Tiflis. In 1889 Naser al-Din Shah recalled from London the envoy Malkom Khan, with whom he was dissatisfied, and sent him there instead, at the same time giving him the title Ala al-Saltaneh. Persian biographies state that he spent 18 years at the London post. His sons were educated in England, and one of them, Hossein Ala, later became prime minister of Iran.

After the Constitutional Revolution Ala al-Saltaneh returned home and headed Persian diplomacy several times. In January 1913 he became head of the government for the first time and led it until August 1914, when Mostowfi ol-Mamalek became prime minister and he himself moved to the foreign ministry. In August 1915 he was minister of justice in Mostowfi’s third government. By 1917 he was nearly eighty. Persian studies describe him as a religious, honest and conservative man who leaned towards Britain, but who was also sickly and not very energetic.

Tehran in a time of terror

The new prime minister took office at a troubled time. Since the autumn of 1916 a secret Punishment Committee (Komite-ye Mojazat) had been active in Tehran, murdering people it regarded as traitors and agents of foreign powers. On 22 May 1917 one of its assassins killed Matin al-Saltaneh, a former deputy and publisher of the newspaper Asr-e Jadid, who was regarded as a supporter of Russia, in his editorial office. Persian studies link Vosugh’s resignation with this murder. The committee did not stop its activities after the change of government: on 7 June, the day after the date given by the British chronology, another former deputy, the cleric Mirza Mohsen, was killed. The organisation was broken up only by arrests in July 1917.

Persia’s international position was also changing. After the February Revolution the Persians began to hope for the withdrawal of Russian troops from the north of the country. The new cabinet was much cooler towards Britain than its predecessor. General Percy Sykes felt this most, because the government withdrew its recognition of the South Persia Rifles, the force Sykes was raising in the south of the country. The British minister in Tehran, Charles Marling, judged in 1918 that Persia had never had a weaker, less competent and more short-sighted government than the one that held power under the “nominal leadership” of Ala al-Saltaneh from June to November 1917.

The cabinet lasted less than half a year. In the second half of November 1917, after the October Revolution in Russia, Ein od-Dowleh, who had been prime minister in 1915, again became head of the government. According to the British chronology, Ala al-Saltaneh continued to run the foreign ministry until January 1918. He died in Tehran on 23 June 1918.