Iranians have often been criticized for overestimating the role played by external forces in the domestic history of their country; they also have been accused of attributing “occult powers” especially to the British and of cultivating a paranoid style in political discourse. Yet as studies of early-20th-century Iran have repeatedly shown, such myths, far from being purely irrational fantasies, had their origins in actual historical realities. In the first quarter of the 20th century, British and British Indian military officers and civilian officials were widely and intimately involved in Iran's political and economic life, both in Tehran and in the provinces, providing levels of political, financial, and military support to their clients, which profoundly affected the political landscape and rearranged local, national, and regional balances of power.