Ann Katharine Swynford Lambton (1912 — 2008), usually known as Nancy Lambton, was a British historian and leading figure on medieval and early modern Persian history, Persian language, Islamic political theory, and Persian social organization. From 1939 till 1945, she was Press attaché of the British Legation to Tehran and then Professor of Persian at SOAS from 1953–79 succeeding Arthur Arberry as holder of that chair. She wrote several books on subjects ranging from Persian grammar and vocabulary to Qajar land reform. Ann Lambton played a role in overthrowing the democratically elected government of Mohammed Mossadegh. After the decision to nationalize Iran’s oil interests in 1951, she advised the British government to undermine the authority of Mossadegh’s regime. She proposed that Oxford University professor R. C. Zaehner should go to Iran and begin covert operations. In 1953, with the help of the CIA, the regime of Mossadegh was overthrown and the Shah was restored to the throne.
آن کترین سواینفورد لمبتون (۸ فوریه ۱۹۱۲ – ۱۹ ژوئیه ۲۰۰۸) پروفسور ایران‌شناس در دانشگاه لندن و پارسی‌دان انگلیسی و کارشناس تاریخ ایران در دوره‌های سلجوقیان، مغولها، صفویان و قاجارها و پژوهشگر برجستهٔ مسائل ایران بود. وی مدتی وابسته مطبوعاتی سفارت بریتانیا در ایران و نیز از ماموران برجستهٔ سازمان‌های اطلاعاتی بریتانیا در دهه‌های ۱۹۴۰ و ۱۹۵۰ میلادی در ایران بود که در کودتای ۲۸ مرداد ۱۳۳۲ نقش داشت .
Robert Charles Zaehner (1913–1974) was a MI6 intelligence officer and also a British academic who specialised in Eastern religions. Born on 8 April 1913 in Sevenoaks, Kent, the son of Swiss immigrants to England, Zaehner studied Greek and Latin, and also ancient Persian including Avestan, gaining first class honors in Oriental Languages. During 1936-37 he studied Pahlavi (another ancient Iranian language), with Sir Harold Bailey at Cambridge. He then began work on his Zurvan, a Zoroastrian Dilemma, a study of the pre-Islamic religion of Iran.
During World War II starting in 1943, he served as a British intelligence officer at their Embassy in Tehran. Often he would be stationed in the field among the hill tribes of northern Iran. After the war he performed a more diplomatic role at Tehran until 1947
Back in Britain, Zaehner took up again his academic research on Zoroastrianism, while also continuing his work as an MI6 officer. During 1949 he was relocated to Malta where he trained anti-Communist Albanians. In 1950 he secured appointment as Lecturer in Persian at Oxford University. He returned briefly to Iran during 1951 to perform government service.
When in Tehran that year he held the rank of Counsellor. In fact, he continued as an MI6 officer. During the Abadan Crisis he was assigned to prolong the Shah’s royal hold on the Throne from the republican challenge led by Mohammed Mossadegh, then the Prime Minister of Iran. Thus Zaehner became engaged in the failed 1951 British effort to topple the government of Iran and return oil production to an entity controlled by the British government, the Anglo-Iranian Oil Company, which had been in effect nationalized by Mossadegh. The plot to overthrow Mossadegh and give the oilfields back to the AIOC was in the hands of a British diplomat called Robin Zaehner, later professor of Eastern religions at Oxford.
رابرت چارلز زنر(زادهٔ ۱۹۱۳- مرگ ۱۹۷۴) متخصص و پژوهشگر ادیان شرقی بریتانیایی بود. او همچنین یک افسر عضو سازمان‌های اطلاعاتی بریتانیا بود و در دهه ۱۹۵۰ میلادی در ایران در کودتای ۲۸ مرداد ۱۳۳۲ نقش داشت .