Lieutenant General Nader Batmanghelich

Fatemeh Moezzi

Lieutenant General Nader Batmanghelich was born in 1903 and graduated from Tehran military academy and set out to Switzerland to continue his education. Upon his return to the country he was appointed positions like commandership of Ardebil brigade, head of army weaponry transport and head of physical training. He was among the officers who was arrested after August 1941 with the deployment of the allies in Iran due to his German inclinations and was detained in Arak for a while. In 1943, with a major general rank, he joined the opponents of Dr. Mosadegh and due to the recommendation of colonel Akhavi to colonel Farzanegan he was responsible as the main organizer of the military. Although he was introduced as not having enough courage by colonel Akhavi, his worry about the power of Tudeh party was one of the factors he joined this group. Upon meeting the American Carol colonel, Colonel Akhavi supported Batmanghelich and in his meeting with Zahedi they decided on Batmaghelich’s commandership of the army general staff. After his role in the coup was stabilized, he participated in the meetings and even of the meetings was held in his country house in Karaj.

When Nasiri presented Zahedi with his premiership order, Batmanghelich was appointed as the head of army general staff by the new prime minister and together with Mostafa Moghadam they headed for the general staff on the midnight of August 15th to hand colonel Riahi his uninstall sentence and for Batmanghelich to settle in his place. Half way there they were notified of the coup’s failure and returned to give Zahedi the news. Batmanghelich, who was scared, went to clonal Farzanegan’s house with Zahedi and then to his own house after a while. On the morning of August 16th he was arrested and transferred to MP center and denied any treason against Dr. Mosadegh.
After the successful coup de ta on August 19th, Batmanghelich was released on the noon of the same day and headed for the general staff building. He was head of general staff until 1955 and assigned to different embassies after that. In Dr. Eghbal’s government he was the minister of interior for a time. He retired with generalship rank and his last position was Khorasan’s governorship and custodianship of the holy shrine of Imam Reza. After the revolution he moved to the US and died in 1991.
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