The army and the creation of the Pahlavi state in Iran, 1910-1926 / Stephanie Cronin.

Includes bibliographical references (pages 281-287) and index.

1. The Government Gendarmerie, 1910-1921. Formation and Early Years. The Impact of the First World War. The Muhajirat and the National Government of Kirmanshah. The Reconstruction of the Government Gendarmerie -- 2. The Cossacks, 1906-1921. The Constitutional Period, 1906-1914. War and Revolution, 1914-1917. The Cossack Division under Colonel Starroselsky. The Cossack Division and the 1921 Coup d'Etat -- 3. 1921: The Cossack Ascendancy. The Destruction of the Gendarmerie. Colonel Muhammad Taqi Khan Pasyan and the Gendarme Regime in Mashhad -- 4. The Construction of the New Army, 1921-1926. Structure and Organisation. Finance. Recruitment. Education and Training. Arms and Ammunition; Auxiliary Services. The Air Force, Navy, Amniyyah and Police. Operations -- 5. Discontent and Disaffection, 1921-1926. The ex-Gendarmes. Republicanism and Royalism. Intrigues Within the High Command. Pay and Conditions: the Mutinies of 1926 -- 6. Civil-Military Relations, 1921-1926.

The Cabinet and the Majlis. The Shah. The Military Ascendancy over the Civil Authorities. The Military and the Civil Population. App. A. Biographical Notes -- App. B. Ranks and Rates of Pay -- App. C. The 'Will' of Ali Quli Khan Pasyan.

In 1921 Riza Khan, a colonel in the Iranian Cossack Brigade, rode on Tehran and, in a military coup that was to change Iran's destiny, took power. Appropriating the state-building objectives of Iranian constitutionalism and nationalism, Riza Khan embarked on the task of constructing a strong, modern, centralized state at the heart of which lay a new national army.

Ruthless and cunning, he used the emergent military and political institutions to crush both civilian and military opposition, and in 1926 crowned himself Shah of Iran.

But in the construction of his army Riza Khan relied upon the material bequeathed to him by the reform efforts of the late nineteenth century and the constitutional revolution.

This unique book - the first to discuss in detail the way in which the modern Iranian army was created - puts the rise of Riza Shah into sorely needed historical context and outlines, in a careful analysis of the way in which Riza ensured the army over civil institutions such as parliament and the provincial authorities, the military roots of monarchical dictatorship in Iran.