It's the Brian Lera Show on WNYC. Good morning, everyone. We are honored to have Christian

Amunpour joining us today to talk about issues in and some historical context for

the war with Iran. Christiane holds the joint positions of CNN's chief international anchor and PBS host

as her show Amunpur airs first on CNN International and then also on PBS as Amunpour and

company, which is where many of you probably

see it in the United States. In New York, for example, that's 4 p.m. and midnight on Channel 13.

And as some of you know, Christian in her own life has also had feet in multiple worlds growing up in

both Iran and the UK, adding to the perspective, of course,

that she can bring to world events like these in her 40-plus years now with CNN.

Christian, we always appreciate it when you take some time from your own very demanding

schedule to come on with us. Welcome back to WNYC.

My pleasure, Brian.

I wonder if we could take advantage of your deep

knowledge by asking you to help listeners know some of the historical context, which I think

doesn't get talked about enough since the beginning of the war. Maybe start the clock in 1953

when Iran had an elected leader named Muhammad Mossadegh

who the United States helped overthrow that year in 1953 and reinstall the Shah of

Iran, raised the Shah Pahlavi. Why did the United States care who ran Iran at that time

and want to see Mossadegh out? Well, because there were competing

objectives, the U.S. CIA did this with the British MI6, their foreign intelligence service here.

And for the British, it was trying to get, you know, a reverse of Mossadeq's nationalization

of the Iranian oil company and the Iranian oil production and

...