Frontier Fictions : Shaping the Iranian Nation, 1804-1946 by Kashani-Sabet Firoozeh

Author:Kashani-Sabet, Firoozeh [Kashani-Sabet, Firoozeh]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Princeton University Press
Published: 2014-10-10T07:00:00+00:00

Another Hankering for Empire

When word arrived in the midst of war that Tsar Nicholas II had abdicated, Iranians warmly embraced the news. For them, too, the Bolshevik Revolution had delivered an unexpected surprise. In 1917 the new Soviet leadership declared that “the treaty for the division of Persia is null and void,” promising the evacuation of Russian troops from Iran “immediately after the cessation of military activities.”35 The Bolshevik Revolution, at least in its inception, seemed a boon for nationalists. Not only was the much reviled Anglo-Russian Treaty of 1907 discarded, Iranian territoriality was partially restored, reviving Iran’s irredentist ambitions.

Because Iran had been overrun by outside armies during the war, Iranian statesmen considered themselves justified in putting forth Iran’s demands for restitution in Paris during negotiations for the Treaty of Versailles (1919). In a telling correspondence with Lord Curzon, the Iranian foreign minister, Nusrat al-Dawlah Firuz, put forth Iran’s demands for “rectification of [its] frontiers.” In particular, Nusrat al-Dawlah stressed the country’s territorial aspirations in the west and the north toward Turkistan. According to him, Iran’s “rights” to those regions rested on several considerations, including “anterior possession … race … [and] language.”36 As he explained, “[T]he population of the countries in question are in large part of the Aryan race, they speak Persian, [and] they are Muslims.” In other words, being Iranian now involved identification with the “Aryan” race, Persian culture, and Islam—a disputable assertion when applied to Turkistan and several Iranian provinces. Nusrat al-Dawlah further argued that whenever “Persia was able to realize its unity and re-establish its natural limits, these territories constituted a part of Iran.”37 With the war over, Iran could again assert its unity in order to reclaim its disputed neighboring provinces.

Restoration of Iran’s frontiers could also improve control of the tribes, whose movements were perceived as a source of friction and disruption. As he noted, “[I]t is in effect at the frontier that the tribes are most pillaging and turbulent; they transport themselves from one point to another in order to escape all jurisdiction. The return to Persia of these regions will therefore contribute to putting an end to this state of disorder.”38 Finally, Nusrat al-Dawlah made an appeal to Curzon on behalf of the “aspiration of [those] populations themselves … to reenter the mother country (Mère Patrie),” referring specifically to appeals from the inhabitants of Nakhjevan in the Caucasus and Sarakh in Turkistan.39 Like Mushir al-Dawlah decades earlier, Nusrat al-Dawlah selected certain cultural expedients to legitimate Iran’s frontier fictions. Whereas Mushir al-Dawlah had revived Keyan history to claim Khuzistan, Nusrat al-Dawlah exploited race and language to label Nakhjevan and Sarakh “Iranian.” The arbitrary frontiers sketched onto the map, he contended, had forced an “unnatural” separation between these societies and Iran. These “orphaned” territories now deserved to extend their natural ties to the Iranian “mother country.” Ethnicity, gendered patriotism, religion, and language thus served as legitimate diplomatic ruses for winning territorial reparations. It is significant that Iran primarily sought territorial reparations after the war. Even

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