Talk:Germany–Iran relations

Inline citations needed

The first two paragraphs of the "first pahlavi era and nazi germany" section are devoid of inline citations. If anyone has the proper sources, please either add them in yourself or mention them here and I will add them. Samuuurai (talk) 04:56, 16 January 2022 (UTC)

Naming

Shouldnt this article be called "Iranian-German relations" or "German-Iranian relations" in order to align with others? I believe in German the most common way to call it would be "German-Persian relations" - even today. How is that? 03.03.06.

Well, we have to keep the name Iran though, as it is the official title (even though Persdian is correct too).--Zereshk 11:52, 6 March 2006 (UTC)

"German-Iranian relations" and "Deutsch-Iranische Beziehungen" 68.237.120.82 02:37, 25 August 2006 (UTC)

Inacurracies

I think there's an anachronism in some facts depicted in that article (speaking about nazi germany in the late 20's ? the nazi state started in 1933) and somethings that aren't verifier. So I applied {{fact}} on some facts needing verification and the {{not verified}} on top of the article. Fabienkhan | talk page 13:06, 6 September 2006 (UTC)

Capitalization of Formal Titles

Throughout the article Reza Khan is referred to as "the shah". I propose that he be referred to as "the Shah". This is because it is a formal title, and thus should be capitalized. I will implement this change if no one objects. Agha Nader 21:30, 10 January 2007 (UTC)Agha Nader

• I agree.--Carabinieri 22:06, 10 January 2007 (UTC)

Done! The Behnam 03:04, 11 January 2007 (UTC)

Expansion

Can someone add some info concerning the occupation fo Iran during WW2 when the Allies (Britain, Russia) feared relations between Iran & Germany (due to significance of Iran and her geopolitical potential for shipping goods using the railway system set up by the shah) & they took control of Iran, kicking out Reza Shah and sending him off to a South African colony to live for the rest of his life (and conditions weren't exactly favorable). Iran played a very important role in ww2 in so far as it helped with the transfer of goods to Russian and British Ally forces,especially when Russia was invaded and there was a shortage of ammunition and food. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 142.58.132.158 (talk) 20:48, 5 November 2009 (UTC)

Edwin Black's source

I strongly suggest avoiding using Edwin Black as a source. At this link shows, he often contradicts his own articles on Iran.

http://www.iranian.com/main/blog/iran-history-buff/edwin-black-lies-and-distorts-irans-history

POV label

this article is skewed towards controversial events. more reliable sources on relationship would be good. LibStar (talk) 06:42, 5 October 2010 (UTC)

removing POV tag with no active discussion per Template:POV

I've removed an old neutrality tag from this page that appears to have no active discussion per the instructions at Template:POV:

This template is not meant to be a permanent resident on any article. Remove this template whenever:

1. There is consensus on the talkpage or the NPOV Noticeboard that the issue has been resolved
2. It is not clear what the neutrality issue is, and no satisfactory explanation has been given
3. In the absence of any discussion, or if the discussion has become dormant.

Since there's no evidence of ongoing discussion, I'm removing the tag for now. If discussion is continuing and I've failed to see it, however, please feel free to restore the template and continue to address the issues. Thanks to everybody working on this one! -- Khazar2 (talk) 21:52, 21 July 2013 (UTC)

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There is so much propaganda without any credible and peer-reviewed sources

For starters, the name change had nothing to do with Germany, it must be removed entirely from this article since it has nothing to do with the relationship between Germany and Iran. I find it increasingly funny that not a single source was provided for that whole paragraph. I'll be erasing this paragraph, the rest that needs to be removed and cleaned up will have to be done by others.

By the early 1930s, Reza Shah or the elder Reza Pahlavi's economic ties with Nazi Germany began worrying the Allied states. Germany's modern state and economy highly impressed the Shah, and there were hundreds of Germans involved in every aspect of the state from setting up factories to building roads, railroads and bridges Reza Shah never traveled to Germany, how would he know what type of country Germany is? Turkey was the only country that he traveled to when he was the Shah.

A certain ideologically driven individual with ulterior motives copy-pasted stuff from another article to this article, and that stuff is made-up. All of it needs to be removed from this article. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:History_of_the_Jews_in_Iran#%22Reza_Shah_sympathized_with_Nazi_Germany%22?_Where_is_the_evidence_for_this?

Sickofthisbs (talk) 20:41, 5 July 2021 (UTC)

Nazis declaring Iranians Aryans/Hitler personally saying so

No they didnt. The original source is a George Lenczowski’s “Russia And The West In Iran” book from the 1940s apparently mistaking the assurances given to the Persian ambassador with an actual declaration. Its been mutated since then where now a source (“Iran under the Ayatollahs”)is claiming that Hitler declared Iranians Aryan (“This meshed well with Adolf Hitler’s declaration of Iran as an Aryan country”) now meshing the supposed Reich statement for Hitlers personal statement, neither of which have any record or primary source beyond to back them up. Ansari’s book goes into actual detail including the Iranians meeting with Walter Gross and no thats not an accurate description of the events of 1936 or any other event. Ansaris “Perceptions of Iran” book is more recent, cites primary sources, and also concludes the Nazis never made such a declaration. (See pages 133-137 of his book) — 76.164.80.158 (talk) 05:51, 7 July 2024 (UTC)

I have reviewed the chapter from Ansari's book about this, and nowhere does it invalidate the Lenczowski source or even address it. Therefore, it is not invalid. Furthermore, the Iranian ambassador's meetings with Walter Gross do not contradict or invalidate Hitler's declaration of Iranians as Aryans. Gross' decision not to blanketly declare Iran as Aryan was a simple bureaucratic decision because Germany had never declared any country to be Aryan. It was simply Gross' job to back off from any big formal declarations like that. None of this contradicts the Reich Cabinet's higher-up decision to include Iranians as Aryans, which we know they did based on the Lenczowski source. Therefore, Iranians were considered Aryans under Nazi Germany. Other sources confirm this as well (i.e., Nikki R Keddie's "Modern Iran: Roots and Results of Revolution", Asgharzadeh's book, Reza Zia-Ebrahimi, etc.) So, the conclusion from Ansari's chapter that Iranians weren't classified as Aryans is incorrect. Confluencer (talk) 20:54, 7 July 2024 (UTC)

Uh yes it does, it doesn't address the source by name but it does just that; says the conclusion is incorrect and states the opposite is true, I never claimed it addresses Lenczowski specifically, I addressed him myself as to why. Yes, there is such thing as greater precedent among sources. Ansari also cites primary source records. Both Keddie and Asgharzadeh cite Lenczowski as their source, they are not separate secondary sources that give further credence to Lenczowski's claim.

Also I found nowhere in Lenczowski any sources cited for these particular claims of a Reich cabinet decree that Iranians are Aryans, which is in fact “officially” calling Iranians Aryans which Ansari specifically said never happened, nor that they were blanketly not included in Nuremberg racial laws beyond books citing page 160 of his book, which is very different then the vague personal assurances made to the Iranian ambassador and is made clear anyways by Ansari, and his book came out around 80 years ago. You probably didnt even check his book (its on internet archive) since he doesnt even claim that Hitler himself called them Aryans at least in that book, thats a statement made by one of the books that otherwise references him, but cites nothing for that statement. I know how to use the captured German documents section at NARA (most available online now) as well as Bundesarchiv search engine (invenio) where literally, and nowhere among them nor any other book other than Lenczowski’s book and the sources using Lenczowski’s book as their sources can I find any evidence either Hitler declared Iranians are Aryan nor that there was a special decree by the Reich cabinet. It’s fictitious, and no it doesnt appear in any of Hitler’s Table Talks or Heiber and Glantz translation of the Fuhrer HQ conferences or any Fuhrerbefehl or anything like that, nor can I find any secondary source reference beyond Lenczowski and the ones citing him. Its fictitious, and we have a source saying that claim is wrong anyways regardless of calling out Lenczowski by name. If you have such evidence please share it for consideration. Im sure you know how to search for secondary sources and here is the Bundesarchiv and here is the Nara link for you to check for yourself (“search within this record group” and use keywords for the nara search itll bring you right to the text of a given document. Just use the tectonics view for invenio). Everything to do with German Foreign Ministry meetings here.

Also I like how one of your edits you said “reverted to sourced claims” as a blanket statement, yet in not one of the sources cited or otherwise could I find the statement that Hitler promised to return Iranian territory after the conquest of the Soviet Union, for example, nor reference to the Nazis comparing their conquests to Arab conquests as a kind of precedent for Lebensraum. By the way it was specified in one of the sources that the Nazis only changed the classifications of Turks to Europeans if the Turk in question was not considered “coloured” (AKA darker than Europeans), which is now removed by you. Herf also clarified in his 2009 book that the vague assurances were told to the ambassador partly because “Iranian” as a citizenship wasnt excluded per say but those of alien blood were, since it was based off race, he does not say either the Nazis made and official declaration that Iranians as an ethnicity were declared non-Alien/Aryan. And for that matter I added sources altogether which you removed. Funny. Nor did you actually explain why you reinstated the “Eastern Aryans” sub-section when Turks and Iranians are already covered in another section. Why is the same topic addressed twice? 76.164.80.158 (talk) 13:04, 8 July 2024 (UTC)

You have just admitted yourself that the Ansari source doesn't address Lenczowski specifically, you assumed yourself that based on the article's own conclusion it is an invalid source. That's not how it works. The Ansari article reached that conclusion through omitting Lenczowski, or at the very least not addressing why the Lenczowski claim isn’t correct. That’s not proper scholarship. You also state that Lenczowki’s claim is unfounded, but just because a primary source cannot be found at the present moment does not invalidate the claim he made in the 1940s (sources can get lost, and not all sources are published or available at a given time). Secondary sources are legitimate in modern scholarship and they don’t automatically become unacceptable based on a lack of primary source. Furthermore, the Ansari chapter reaches the bold and blanket (incorrect) conclusion that Iranians weren’t considered Aryans by the Third Reich, but not a single point made in that article contradicts or invalidates the special decree pushed by the Reich Cabinet in declaring Iranians as Aryans. These are two separate issues and the discussion of the former does not discredit the latter. The onus would be on Ansari to prove Lenczowski’s claim wrong, which he didn’t even talk about.

Secondly: yes, you’re right that there is a hierarchy between sources, but the establishment of primary sources in proving facts not directly relevant to a secondary source does not invalidate that secondary source. So, Ansari’s proof via primary sources of the foreign ambassador meetings with Walter Gross does not contradict the Lenczowski secondary source, since that secondary source is talking about the Reich Cabinet special decree, unrelated to the ambassador meetings. In other words, Ansari’s conclusion is based off an omission of Lenczowski. This is why Ansari cannot be used as a valid source for the claim that Iranians weren’t classified as Aryan. There is no source available, primary or secondary, that directly invalidates Lenczowki’s claim. Just because you personally believe that source is unfounded doesn’t mean it is (again, you admitted this yourself—you admitted that Ansari doesn’t address Lenczowski whatsoever, but rather that you're the one stating Lenczowski is illegitimate based on Ansari’s article).

This is why citing Ansari as a source for why “the nazi regime never officially declared Iranians as Aryan” is incorrect and unfounded. We have multiple, almost endless sources confirming the exact opposite. You linked me to a bunch of search engines for finding primary sources, and those are great, but again, the history of the foreign ministry meetings does not debunk the Reich Cabinet special decree claim. You stated in your reply “we have a source saying that claim is wrong anyways regardless of calling out Lenczowski by name” but I just showed that’s not the case. Ansari didn’t directly address it and the topics he discusses does not contradict Lenczowski.

By repudiating Lenczowski, you are also disputing an entire line of scholarly work that confirms Iranians’ Aryan classification by the Nazis (Nikki R. Keddie, Dilip Hiro, Jennifer Jenkins, Reza Zia-Ebrahimi, Ali Asgharzadeh, and Matthias Kuntzel have ALL discussed and confirmed the Iranian racial classification as Aryans in Nazi Germany within their scholarly works). You have not provided any evidence to debunk their works either by virtue of your failure to discredit Lenczowski.

Hitler’s personal declaration of Iran as an “Aryan country” comes from Dilip Hiro’s book “Iran under the Ayatollahs” and Nikki R. Keddie’s book “Modern Iran: Roots and Results of Revolution”. Once again, these are legitimate scholarly sources. You state that Hiro’s claim of Hitler’s personal declaration of Iran as an Aryan country is from Lenczowski, however, nowhere in the book does Hiro cite Lenczowski for that claim. He must have had another source (though even if it was based on Lenczowski it wouldn’t be invalid, but it’s not). So, the Hiro source still stands legitimate.

Lastly, I have undone all your edits undoing the sourced content proving Iranians were classified as Aryans and immune to Nuremberg Laws. On Wikipedia, you do not undo claims that are substantively sourced until a definitive consensus is reached as to why the sources are wrong. And it’s unlikely you’re going to reach a consensus here.

P.S. I don’t know why you assumed I haven’t read some sources. I have read every single source related to Iranian relations with Nazi Germany and Iranian racial classifications in Nazi Germany that have been published so far. Also, on the “Nazi racial theories” page, Turks and Iranians weren’t covered in another subsection. No idea where you got that from. I reinstated the parts you removed, which were sourced (under the “Eastern Aryans” subsection).

On this basis, I am keeping the Wikipedia article the way it looked before, with Iranians correctly classified as Aryans by the Nazi state. Confluencer (talk) 08:20, 9 July 2024 (UTC)

Wikipedia doesn’t seem to like anonymous posters so I created an account to use from here on. I needed to make an in-depth long-winded reply to deal with this: Since I don’t want to be misunderstood or straw-manned further — My fellow interlocutor doesn’t seem to think that Motadel/Ansari clearly contradicting Lenczowski is in-fact evidence, when it clearly is. He also isn’t addressing the other issues brought up. — I will lay out this specific issue of the claim Iranians were declared as Aryans by Nazi governance in clearer detail and make a request for comment instead of a tail-chasing exercise. I feel like if you say you know these sources, and I have to take you at your word with that, you should know that was a dishonest way to present the situation and further discussion is likely futile, but for the uninformed on this subject…

The first thing I take issue with in your argument, and which I feel is very disingenuous if you have in fact read every source about Nazi racial policy concerning Iran as you claim, is that by “repudiating Lenczowski”, I’m also doing that to “an entire line of scholarly work that confirms Iranians’ Aryan classification by the Nazis (Nikki R. Keddie, Dilip Hiro, Jennifer Jenkins, Reza Zia-Ebrahimi, Ali Asgharzadeh, and Matthias Kuntzel have ALL discussed and confirmed the Iranian racial classification as Aryans in Nazi Germany within their scholarly works)”

Your verbiage implies they did independent research and reached the same conclusion this way (btw I’m disputing the statement the Nazis declared the Iranians as Aryans, not the entirety of the works where this claim is made as unreliable), so lets look at the sources that my fellow wikipedia editor brings up.

About each source — with Author, “Title” (original year of release), page number / “exact sentence of relevance with preceding and proceeding sentence”, *citation/source given by author for it, and [general context and remarks. ]

- Nikki R. Keddie, “Modern Iran: Roots and Results of Revolution” (2003) page 101 / “The Germans also advanced militarily and politically. Nazi ideology and agents were prominent, and the Germans declared Iran a pure Aryan country. Reza Shah was not averse to Nazi phrases and methods, which suited his dictatorial and nationalistic inclinations.” *No direct citation is given for this by Keddie, but both of Lenczowski’s books on Iran (“Russia and the West in Iran, 1918-1948” and “Iran under the Pahlavis”) are cited in the bibliography at the end. [Mentioned in passing as part of a more general history of Modern Iran. No in-depth discussion about Nazi racial policies concerning Iranians or on this decleration. I cannot find any reference to Hitler personally declaring Iran as Aryan in here either.]

- Nikki R. Keddie, “Roots of revolution : an interpretive history of modern Iran” (1981), page 110 / “Seen as a base against the Soviet Union, Iran was penetrated by the Germans militarily and politically. Nazi ideology and agents were prominent, and the Germans declared Iran a pure Aryan country. Reza Shah was not averse to Nazi phrases and methods, as they suited his dictatorial and nationalistic inclinations.” *No direct citation given for this by Keddie, but again both of Lenczowski’s books are cited in the bibliography. [Mentioned in passing as part of a more general history of Modern Iran. No in-depth discussion about Nazi racial policies concerning Iranians and no expounding on this decleration. Basically the same as Keddie’s later book, which is almost just this book repackaged anyways.]

- Dilip Hiro, “Iran under the Ayatollahs” (1985), page 296 / “The next year, at the suggestion of the Iranian legation in Germany - then under Nazi rule - the Shah changed the name of his country from Persia (a derivative of Pars) to Iran, the homeland of the Aryan race. This meshed well with Adolf Hitler’s declaration of Iran as an Aryan country. Helped by Iran’s Monopoly of Foreign Trade Law of 1931, and the presence of German experts at the Bank Melli, Iranian-German trade increased rapidly.” *No citation for this, but he cites Keddie’s 1981 book in the bibliography, who in turn cites Lenczowski in his work for the same remark, so yes the ultimate source is Lenczowski. [No in-depth discussion of Nazi racial policies on Iranians. Even Lenczowski himself made no claim Hitler said this personally, but I think it’s pretty obvious that Hiro meant this in a metonym way (e.g. ‘Hitler Invaded Poland’, ‘Hitler Invaded the Soviet Union’, ‘Saddam Invaded Kuwait’, etc), and not in the way it is quoted in the wikipedia article at all. Too mention an opposite problem, there is confusion in the way “Reich Cabinet” is used by Lenczowski and some of the other authors citing him, when a declaration like that obviously would come from someone who’s position concerned the matter (like Walter Gross, who was responsible for Nazi racial policy.) if it wasn’t reported by the Reichsgesetzblatt like the Nuremberg Laws were.]

- Miron Rezun, “The Iranian crisis of 1941 : the actors, Britain, Germany, and the Soviet Union” (1982), page 28 / “The Nazi Weltanschauung was very effectively employed as a weapon of propaganda. To impress the Iranians, a special decree had been issued by the Reich Cabinet as early as 1936 by which the Iranians were exempted from the restrictions of the Nuremberg Racial Laws as ‘pure-blooded Aryans’. German authors strove to arouse the sympathy of leading Iranians by drawing endless parallels among Reza Shah, Hitler, Mussolini and Kemal Atatürk, underlying the role and virtue of Führerprinzip.” *Lenczowski’s book “Russia and the West in Iran, 1918-1948” page 160 is cited for this statement. [No further comment is made about the alleged 1936 “Reich Cabinet decree” in question.]

- Ali Asgharzadeh, “Iran and the Challenge of Diversity“ (2007), page / “The Nazis found a favorable climate amongst the Iranian elite to spread fascistic and racist propaganda. The Nazi propaganda machine advocated the (supposedly) common Aryan ancestry of ‘the two Nations.’ In order to further cultivate racist tendencies, in 1936, the Reich Cabinet issued a special decree exempting Iranians from the restrictions of the Nuremberg Racial Laws on the grounds that they were ‘pure-blooded Aryans’ (Lenczowski, 1944, p. 160). In 1939, the Nazis provided Persians with what they called a German Scientific Library.” *cites page 160 of Lenczowksi’s “Russia and the West in Iran, 1918-1948” as source, although he mistakes the release year as 1944 instead of 1949 (confirmed as the actual book he is quoting from by the fact he cites the exact page number where this information is present in the aforementioned Lenczowski book) [Goes into more detail than some of the other authors on Nazi Aryanist beliefs and Iran, but the decree is only addressed here and he adds nothing beyond repeating Lenczowski to it.]

- Evrand Abrahamian, “A History of Modern Iran” (2008), page 86 / “A Government circular explained that whereas ‘Persia’ was associated with Fars and Qajar decadence, “Iran invoked the glories and and birthplace of the ancient Aryans. Hitler, in one of his speeches, had proclaimed that the Aryan race had links to Iran. Moreover, a number of prominent Iranians who had studied in Europe had been influenced by racial theorists such as Count Gobineau who claimed that Iran, because of its ‘racial’ composition, had greater cultural-psychological affinity with Nordic peoples of northern Europe than with the rest of the Middle East.” *No source cited for this statement, Lenczowski’s second book “Iran under the Pahlavis” is cited in the bibliography. [This isn’t even a statement that Hitler declared them Iranians, and is the one thing cited that constitutes something else than just a repeat of Lenczowski. Regardless, a speech by Hitler saying there were links between Iran and Aryans, is not at all the same thing as Hitler (or a “Reich Cabinet”) declaring Iranians as Aryans.]

In Jennifer Jenkins case, she wrote an article called “Iran in the New Nazi Order” that is behind a rather expensive pay-wall at Jstor.org. I coughed up the cash and despite my fellow wikipedia editor’s claims, she makes no mention whatsoever about the Nazis/Hitler declaring Iranians to be Aryan. Very funny stuff. Finally, although Küntzel in his 2009 book “The Germans and Iran” (the english title) is cited by Ansari/Motadel as inaccurately describing German racial description of Iranians, he actually tells of Alfred Rosenberg telling Gross that Iranians could never expect to be declared officially Aryans at page 51, but at the same time he cites Lenczowski’s 1949 book.

Every single source I can find that repeats this claim cites Lenczowski or, in Hiro’s case, cites Keddie who in turn cites Lenczowski. I would say, if Confluencer has read every single published work about this subject as he has claimed, he is hiding circular referencing here to make an inaccurate argument. None of them make an argument for why Lenczowski is correct, or indeed anything beyond repeating him in near-verbatim words (occasionally replacing “Reich Cabinet” with “Hitler”, omitting 1936 as the year, etc nothing else and no added depth). They just repeat him, they don’t reach “that conclusion themselves” in any independent sense and certainly don’t do any further analysis or add further referencing as can be clearly seen from the above. Also, you attempt to bring up Reza Zia-Ebrahimi as an example of someone supporting Lenczowski. Actually, what he says in “The emergence of Iranian nationalism“ is very different from what you claim he supports. At page 160: “There have been claims that in 1936 a special decree of the Reich cabinet exempted Iranians from the restrictions of the Nuremberg Racial Laws as "pure Aryans," but according to David Motadel, all foreigners were exempt from these laws, which were only directed - against German Jews, and, moreover, this legislation never used the term "Aryan."” Not entirely accurate on Reza’s part since elsewhere its been clarified by authors that “alien blood” was included, and this in theory would effect Iranians, but huh, so either you were lying about what he said and hoped I wouldn’t check for myself, or you didn’t know to begin with. Either way, you are demonstrably grasping at straws and being disingenuous. Reza also references Lenczowski later in his work so is perfectly aware of his claim.

The original statement from Lenczowski in his book “Russia and the West in Iran, 1918-1948” (1949) is the following: “To remove any causes for misunderstanding under the Nuremberg Racial Laws, a special decree of the Reich cabinet in 1936 exempted the Iranians, as ‘pure Aryans’, from their restrictive provisions.” Lenczowski gives no citation for this, neither primary source nor secondary source nor otherwise. That is a main issue, rather than your imagined claim that the primary source could no longer exist, he doesn’t cite anything for it to begin with. He expounds no further on this supposed decree, does not say “Hitler” personally made it, and he identifies specifically 1936 as the time frame he is talking about. Harf covered the same events in 1936 and made no assertion that the Nazis declared Iranians as Aryans.

So how does Ansari’s book prove Lenczowski’s claim false? Firstly I should have been more clear earlier. The book as a whole, “Perceptions of Iran” (2013) is from Ansari, but the chapter in question is actually credited to David Motadel (who also wrote “Islam and Nazi Germany’s war”) who like Ansari is just as much of a respected scholar as the previous authors, and wrote this chapter conducting research at the University of Freiberg.

Here is the isolated chapter for all to read. He identifies the events in question (pages 134-135, or 16-17 of the PDF page counter), a controversy about the Nuremberg laws around the time of the Berlin Olympics that could have prevented countries like Iran and Egypt from attending in protest. He notes that Walter Gross, the head of Nazi Racial Policy, in a meeting with the Iranian ambassador who requested clarification, ruled out declaring Iranians as Aryans and sneered at the suggestion by the Iranian ambassador that they were Aryans. The exact statement given by Motadel: “'The envoy can, on no account however, expect that the Iranians, lock, stock and barrel, be declared as Aryans,' he sneered, reminding that the 'term Aryan' (Arierbegriff would be defined in each particular case.” It continues: “Gross was unimpressed when the diplomat explained to him that Iranians were the 'ancestors of the Aryan race', and he evaded definitive statements.” Before concluding “Yet Iranians were never officially classed as 'Aryans' by the Nazi regime. 120”

Motadel cites multiple times the Bundesarchiv branch in Berlin for his source. On top of that, I was wrong earlier when I accepted your premise that Ansari/Motadel didnt call out Lenczowski. I originally glanced at his footnotes only to confirm he cited primary sources…but on second inspection, and contrary to your original bold claim that he didn’t, he did specifically say Lenczowski was wrong! Under footnote 120 (page 145), given at the statement that they were never declared Aryans, he states this has been reported in-accurately before including by Lenczowski, Küntzel, and Rezun. And by the way, even if he hadn’t called him out by name, it still could be evidence of the claim made by Lenczowski being un-factual according to wikipedia standards, since the “fact” is in dispute. See here.

On top of all this, as Rezun himself noted in “The Iranian crisis of 1941” pages 62-63, and in his book “The Soviet Union in Iran” page 101 (footnote 140), George Lenczowski served the Polish Government-in-exile in WWII and was attached as attache with the British Army Intelligence in Iran during WWII, the same British army which occupied Iran along with the Soviets on the charge of Pro-Nazi actions by the Shah in 1941. He was not a neutral observer, and may not be reliable in this context anyways for political reasons, exaggerating the closeness of Iran and Nazi Germany, see how political bents are addressed in context Wikipedia:Reliable sources/Perennial sources. On top of that, on page II of “The Soviet Union and Iran”, Rezun notes that “But where Lenczowski at least attempted to break new ground in this field, regardless of the extensive perlod covered in his work, scholars who afterwards attempted to carry this theme further afield only succeeded in extending the time-span, accepting at face value what Lenczowski has had to offer.” That last part is the same observation I’ve expressed about the authors quoting him. The statements relating to any declaration by the Nazis that Iranians were Aryan in their view, which is irreconcilable with Motadels research and has been specifically called out by him as false among other issues, should be removed.

About my removal of “Eastern Aryans” from the Nazi Racial Theories article, uh yes they are dealt with in the very next subsection,see , which I didn’t remove. Come to think of it having the Western Aryans part before British and French is also pointless. If it’s supposed to act as a heading it doesn’t fit either with a paragraph right below it.

Also other things need to be clarified. Confluencer, although Motadel agrees that the Nazi’s classified Turks as “European”, it excluded Turks considered “Colored” as clarified in Harf’s book. And by the way Confluencer, since I don’t claim to have read everything on this subject like you have I could have missed it, but I haven’t found in any source the claim made currently in this article: “Hitler personally promised that if he defeated the Soviet Union, he would return all of the Persian land taken by Russians during the nineteenth and twentieth centuries.” There is no source for this cited in the article. I note you have been warned about adding material without reliable sources before by WikiLinuz. Please provide the citation and page number. Also, concerning this particular article, both LibStar and Sickofthisbs have raised similar reliability issues to my concerns. In accordance with Czello’s wishes I’ll wait for consensus before further edits. Thanks. Nosam89 (talk) 06:36, 11 July 2024 (UTC)

I appreciate you taking the time to write all this out. However, I still don't think you grasp the point I'm making. Essentially what you've done for most of your response is find every secondary source that discusses the classification of Iranians as Aryans by the Nazi state and linked them back to Lenczowski, therefore putting doubt on them. I know they mostly use Lenczowski as a source, that's not the issue.

[Also, side note: regarding Reza Zia-Ebrahimi, he has an article titled "Self-Orientalization and Dislocation: The Uses and Abuses of the "Aryan" Discourse in Iran" from July 2011 where he states "Racial affinity was made official in 1936 when a special decree of the Reich cabinet exempted Iranians from the restrictions of the Nuremberg Laws." The article is found here. So yes, he does in fact discuss this. I wasn't lying. Also you even included some other secondary sources which I never brought up in my original response. But thanks for the extra sources.]

My main contention is this: Motadel's statement about Walter Gross saying "The envoy can, on no account however, expect that the Iranians, lock, stock and barrel, be declared as Aryans" is not in contradiction with the Reich Cabinet separately passing a special decree declaring them as such and exempting them from restrictions to Nuremberg Laws (for example: Gross could say Iranians cannot be blanketly classified as Aryans, but then later that same year the higher-up Reich Cabinet decree could override that decision). The issue with Motadel is that he makes a definitive conclusion without consideration of Lenczowski and the Reich Cabinet special decree. You said he does, in fact, state that Lenczowski is wrong on his statement, via the footnotes. But what's his basis for it? How come he doesn't address it explicitly within the article and provide an argument debunking it, or considering it? This is VERY important in scholarship. The entire point of scholarship, especially when making a novel point, is that you provide an outline of previous scholarly work on the topic, lay out your contention with them, and then present your own line of thought and evidence overriding it. Motadel does not do this in his article. His article is absolutely written as if it's completely omitting previous scholarly work on Nazi racial classifications of Iranians. For this reason, his single source cannot be deemed to override the mountains of scholarly work written on the topic of Iranians' Aryan classification in Nazi Germany.

In the wikipedia page you linked me, titled "When sources are wrong", it states that a fact can be put into dispute when "A secondary source conflicts with a primary source, where there is no way for the former to know better than the latter." Lenczowski's claim—and all the subsequent scholarships—is a secondary source but it does not conflict with the primary sources that Motadel bases his conclusion on (the claim of Gross stating Iranians cannot be uniformly declared as Aryans). I am not contending the ambassador's discussions with Walter Gross. They happened and there is evidence for it. But a bold and absolute conclusion that "Iranians were never officially classed as 'Aryans' by the Nazi regime" does not follow from this. I already explained why in the paragraph above.

You have cited Rezun to make the point of Lenczowski being potentially biased due to his role in the Polish Government-in-Exile. If we're going to go down this line of reasoning, I could argue Lenczowski actually had greater access, and more knowledge of, ongoing diplomatic and political events at the time, which is how he was informed of the Reich cabinet special decree in the 1940s. Lenczowski, in those same pages where he discusses the special decree, also takes note of other racially-related measures between the two countries like the "German Scientific Library" and other relations which are considered by scholars today to be true. So I fail to see how his "political bend", linking the closeness of Iran and Germany, affects his book enough to blatantly lie about the Reich cabinet decree (that is the implication here). Also, on the "Reliable sources/Perennial sources" I legitimately couldn't find any place where it discusses "political bents" as a reason to doubt a source. Maybe that's just me. But regardless, even if such a standard exists on Wikipedia, I do not think the evidence is sufficient to discredit Lenczowski on that basis here.

Regarding the "Eastern Aryans" subsection on Nazi racial theories page, I see you had just removed the introductory paragraph before it transition to "Iranians". That's a short subsection that just categorizes and introduces the ethnic groups/nationalities classified as Aryans in that section. I see no reason to have removed that. It's not a big deal. You also brought up the subsection on Turks on Nazi racial theories. I have no contention with you there, I never edited or originally added information on that subsection. Lastly, on that same page, you brought up that the statement “Hitler personally promised that if he defeated the Soviet Union, he would return all of the Persian land taken by Russians during the nineteenth and twentieth centuries" is unsourced. You're right, it is unsourced. I wasn't the one who added this into the wikipedia page, I don't know where it comes from, and I have no source for it either. I have consensus with you that it shouldn't be there. You may remove that one sentence.

Overall, however, it seems like we cannot reach a consensus on the main issue at hand, related to Iranians being officially classified as Aryans by Nazi Germany. Since I think we've both stretched out all our points, further discussion between us would be mostly repetition. I see you've already created a RFC heading. What we can do is wait for other users to join the discussion. What do you think? Confluencer (talk) 17:39, 11 July 2024 (UTC)

Addressing some of this, your quotes in bold.

”"Iranians were never officially classed as 'Aryans' by the Nazi regime” does not follow from this. I already explained why in the paragraph above.” He cites his sources and reaches that conclusion and cites Lenczowski as being wrong, helped by Lenczowski himself identifying the exact time frame of 1936 for the supposed decree in question. It is infact a perfectly definitive statement from Motadel. None of your sources addresses Motadel’s criticism and simply repeat Lenczowski. You also claimed he didn’t address Lenczwoski to begin with when he does. Motadel’s article is cited by other authors too, like Jennifer Jenkins and Reza for example.

”This is VERY important in scholarship. The entire point of scholarship, especially when making a novel point, is that you provide an outline of previous scholarly work on the topic, lay out your contention with them, and then present your own line of thought and evidence overriding it. Motadel does not do this in his article. His article is absolutely written as if it's completely omitting previous scholarly work on Nazi racial classifications of Iranians. For this reason, his single source cannot be deemed to override the mountains of scholarly work written on the topic of Iranians' Aryan classification in Nazi Germany.” He does just that, highlights the statements of the other authors as wrong (gives exact page numbers)at page 145 in conjunction with page 135, states why, and cites not a single but multiple primary sources under those paragraphs for it (note they are all from the Bundesarchiv, but that is just where the primary sources in question are held but do not originally come from, the “sources” are different file groups from different times). Your approach appears to be ignoring that Lenczowski cited no source, and using other sources citing Lenczowski (and who dont expound or source this to anyone but him and someone deriving from him). You’ve created circular referencing in this logic: Lenczowski cant be wrong because other authors cite him, the other authors cant be wrong because they cite Lenczowski (or cite another author who in turn cites Lenczowski). And calling it “mountains of scholarly work” is a bit rich. Nazi racial classifications on Iranians and Nazi relations with Iran is an obscure topic to begin with to say the least, let alone, as Rezun once noted, that the work on the topic scarcely exists beyond repeating Lenczowski at face value.

”Lenczowski, in those same pages where he discusses the special decree, also takes note of other racially-related measures between the two countries like the "German Scientific Library" and other relations which are considered by scholars today to be true” What does that have to do with a Reich decree about Iranians being Aryan? Motadel didnt say what you bring up as wrong, he says that is false.

”Also, on the "Reliable sources/Perennial sources" I legitimately couldn't find any place where it discusses "political bents" as a reason to doubt a source. Maybe that's just me.” Check under the discussions/summary column to see how infact political bias has been factored in decisions before.

”You have cited Rezun to make the point of Lenczowski being potentially biased due to his role in the Polish Government-in-Exile. If we're going to go down this line of reasoning, I could argue Lenczowski actually had greater access, and more knowledge of, ongoing diplomatic and political events at the time, which is how he was informed of the Reich cabinet special decree in the 1940s.” How does that train of logic work? He was in IRAN not Germany. Iranian perceptions and declarations are different from German ones. He didnt have access to primary German records at all during the war unlike Motadel. He didnt bother to cite anything either. I have also cited Rezun as agreeing that none of the authors conducted their own scholarly work “confirming” this decree to be true in his perception at the time, since all they did was cite Lenczowski, and nothing contradicts what he says as far as I can tell, that is in-fact the case even since his time of writing. You cannot use Lenczowski as a source to say Lenczowski was right.

”In the wikipedia page you linked me, titled "When sources are wrong"[9], it states that a fact can be put into dispute when "A secondary source conflicts with a primary source, where there is no way for the former to know better than the latter." Lenczowski's claim—and all the subsequent scholarships—is a secondary source but it does not conflict with the primary sources that Motadel bases his conclusion on.” Motadel says it is wrong and cites primary sources for why, so yes it is in conflict with primary sources although your opinion is otherwise, and as it happens I agree with Motadel. Also see “A non-contemporaneous source conflicts with a contemporaneous source, where there is no way for the former to know better than the latter.” in that same link.

Thanks for coming to an agreement on the unsourced statement, I’ll remove it later. Otherwise, I agree we wait for other users.Nosam89 (talk) 18:20, 11 July 2024 (UTC)

So my rfc has been expired for over 2 months now and no-one has weighed in. I’m considering the bold option (see Wikipedia:Be bold) for here and the other two articles since this discussion is now over 3 months old and the rfc 2 months expired. Nosam89 (talk) 02:53, 19 October 2024 (UTC)

Revive the RFC. There is still no consensus. The problem with the bold option is that other users who disagree with your perspective (such as myself) can easily implement the bold option by restoring their stance and undoing your edit. It will result in an edit war. Better to RFC again. KingofEdits103 (talk) 05:02, 19 October 2024 (UTC)

I take it this is still the user that went by “Confluencer” not long ago, based on your edit history and the fact this account became active after Confluencer has gone inactive and you responded so soon? Just want to make sure I’m identifying the right person. Anyways I may very well do that (revive the rfc), I’m frustrated with the lack of engagement from other editors. Nosam89 (talk) 07:00, 19 October 2024 (UTC)

On top of everything else, I have further evidence to add. Otto Wagener quotes Hitler (from "Hitler: Memoirs of a confidant" page 205) as saying (my emphasis) "At present, besides applying the term 'race' to the white, yellow, and black races —which cannot scientifically be justified and grounded as a valid categorization - it is customary within the white race, for example, to designate the Semites and the Aryans as 'races.' Among the Semites, one counts the Arabs, the Israelites, the Egyptians, perhaps also the Persians and possibly several other tribes. Among the Aryans are the Germans, the Romans, the Slavs, and several others-for example, the Celts."

Further from another book, ”In administrative enforcement of race protection some are to considered alien in species miscegenation is prohibited, particularly all Jews, gypsies, with whom any and colored persons as well as their hybrids to definitely fixed degrees, and likewise races, the members of the Near-Eastern and Oriental races.” From "Hitler's Professors: The Part of Scholarship in Germany's Crimes Against the Jewish People", page 112 — quoting an official party publication by Dr. Karl Metzger and which Walter Gross was also represented. Pretty revealing…does anyone still seriously believe that the lenczowski claim is true? M.S. Asher (talk) 05:05, 19 January 2026 (UTC)

Since the Rfc hasn’t been renewed still I’ve asked for Wikipedia:Third opinion to help resolve this. M.S. Asher (talk) 01:38, 22 January 2026 (UTC)

Ok that's fine. I haven't been too active these days due to an insane schedule so I never got around to doing the RFC. But I will continue discussing things here as things come up, whenever i have the chance. LordSer8000 (talk) 04:19, 25 January 2026 (UTC)

 RESPONSE TO THIRD OPINION REQUEST

---

This isn't really an "official" third opinion as there are more than two editors involved. That said, I am still willing to add an additional opinion into the mix in an attempt at achieving consensus. @Confluencer, @KingofEdits103, @M.S. Asher, and @Nosam89; Do any of you have anything further to add to the discussion (I just noticed that @Confluencer/@KingofEdits103 is blocked, so I suppose we won't be hearing from them). The opinions in the two sections below must be considered in any attempt to form consensus, as well. MWFwiki (talk) 06:15, 22 January 2026 (UTC)

Hi, I will post again with a response when I have time tonight, I do have more to add. Thx M.S. Asher (talk) 20:37, 22 January 2026 (UTC)

Take your time. Just tag me when you respond; sometimes I don't get reply notifications. MWFwiki (talk) 20:55, 23 January 2026 (UTC)

Hi MWFwiki. I deeply apologized that it has been so long, I firstly launched a sock-puppet investigation (that needed time) into this new Melons user where the conclusion was he was likely to be a sock-puppet and that LordSer8000 definitely was (Lord has been banned), see here Wikipedia:Sockpuppet investigations/Confluencerist, and then major things came up in my life. Will you still offer your third opinion? Thx M.S. Asher (talk) 07:22, 24 March 2026 (UTC)

I was notified a while ago that I was blocked on my account (I'm LordSer) due to a sockpuppet investigation you opened on me. I decided to wait until the investigation file officially closed before commenting again (due diligence and all), but since you decided to comment now before the file is closed, I will respond.

It should have been clear by the way I was communicating with you that I was in fact Confluencer/KingofEdits. In fact I thought you already knew this because you can see it on my profile. The only reason I got banned on my original account (Confluencerist) ages ago is because my account was compromised, so I made a new one and they banned me again. I didn't actually do anything wrong. Also I will say it's strange you included the user Dr.MelonsPHD in your investigation, as that account is not even me and I have no connections to that account. Melons ended up not even getting blocked after the initial CheckUser investigation, so that already shows I'm not him (and the CheckUser admin only made a GUESS speculating that I might "know" that user, which isn't even true). The file hasn't even closed yet, so the admin concluded nothing, so for you to say the file "concluded" with the result being "likely" is false.

It seems kind of clear to me that the Melons user got into this discussion through your third opinion post (he literally says so) which drew in traffic. You seem to be throwing a fit because you got an opinion you didn't like, even though YOU were the one who opted for a third opinion.

Now regarding our discussion here, I hope you understand that getting me blocked doesn't automatically resolve the consensus. As per wikipedia's standards, consensus is about the strength of our arguments and reaching a mutual understanding, not who’s left standing. It's not a popularity contest or put to a vote. Having your opposition blocked does not by itself create consensus for the remaining editors that are left. You can’t just eliminate me out of the discussion then rush to impose your POV, otherwise you are gaming the system (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Gaming_the_system). You still need continued discussion and input from the various users involved here until something is reached. Like MWFWiki said, the opinions of everyone here needs to be taken into consideration. My arguments as Confluencer are still critical to the discussion towards reaching some kind of consensus especially since I was an original party to the discussion. Melon's arguments are also still in play for this consensus. So are yours, MWFWiki's, and everyone else's. We must wait for everyone's input as the discussion progresses. I just want to make sure we're all clear on that.

-LordSer8000/Confluencer Confluencerer (talk) 14:22, 24 March 2026 (UTC)

Just so you are aware MWFWiki, asher’s claim that Melons is me is a lie. The conclusion of the file wasn't that Melons is me. The file hasn't even closed yet and the checkuser only made a guess based off a first impression, saying that he leans towards Melons knowing me personally over the idea that Melons and I are the same, snd regardless, thats just his GUESS, as the file hasnt closed yet. Melons isn't even blocked! We cannot ignore his opinion.

As for LordSer however, yes that is me. I have to create another alt here just for this discussion because otherwise, if im blocked, asher may rush to impose his POV on the article without my input. Confluencerer (talk) 14:27, 24 March 2026 (UTC)

oh my goodness you are so manipulative! Firstly…see user:Confluencerist “17 April 2024 The Blade of the Northern Lights blocked Confluencerist with an expiration time of indefinite (account creation blocked)” so apparently you arent even supposed to have an account unless this got lifted somehow (if you did give a link plz). As for this “It seems kind of clear to me that the Melons user got into this discussion through your third opinion post (he literally says so) which drew in traffic.“ oh really? He “literally says so” it has to be true. Aside from being new, had never answered a third opinion before and had never even edited this webpage or any related topic to this before his post (check his/your/your friend’s edit history) history and hadn't even been active for awhile, and then within a couple of hours this user posts basically the same round about argument as you using the same sources claiming to be “totally different” when I asked for a third opinion in order to preempt another user weighing in! It seems you threw a fit that you werent going to be able to control the opinion flow. Notice I didnt complain at all about you shifting accounts so long as it was obvious it was the same person (I wasnt aware you had sock puppet and vandalism bans on your previous accounts) until somebody claiming to be a third party popped in with such mysterious circumstances. I brought as this up in the update in the sock-puppet investigations and he concluded that, in addition to banning your other account, that Melons was either you or a friend of yours. Either was a deliberate attempt attempt at gaming the system…and yet you have the nerve to accuse me of this when you have been banned repeatedly AND proven to be someone that has done this before, and when evidence mounts on you try to deflect! M.S. Asher (talk) 15:07, 24 March 2026 (UTC)

”Melon's arguments are also still in play for this consensus. So are yours, MWFWiki's, and everyone else's. We must wait for everyone's input as the discussion progresses. I just want to make sure we're all clear on that.” Oh you have had plenty of input, nice Freudian slip tho that you will continue to bring about more “input” from other accounts associated with you until you force thru your way. Anyways I’m not sure how this discussion can even go on unless heavy moderator attention is brought to this discussion. Nobody ever discounted your original opinion’s merit, everyone is entitled to one, but rather that you appear to be doing exactly what your are deflecting towards me: gaming the system to manufacture your consensus in your favor. M.S. Asher (talk) 15:13, 24 March 2026 (UTC)

Btw, this new account of yours was created literally today. I made my response about this before you chimed early this morning in the middle of the night (past midnight) US time (you are apparently an American English speaker). You respond some hours later (see during the morning US time. Given that all your other accounts are banned here aside from this Melons, and this account was created after I posted, and you havent been active here for two months…how exactly did you get notified so fast? Do you mean to tell me you have been checking this page periodically every day for two months without bothering to create an account or anything, or is it more likely that you received a notification from a friend/or sock-puppet account that hasnt been banned and would have been notified of a new post? Like gee I dont know this Melons account? Please spare me the mind games. M.S. Asher (talk) 15:38, 24 March 2026 (UTC)

Yes, I check this page daily while logged out to see if there are any updates. Ive been doing it that way since my last account LordSer got banned. Obviously I had to create a new account today after you commented to set things straight. Confluencerer (talk) 16:26, 24 March 2026 (UTC)

How am I gaming the system? I am not the Melons guy and nothing has concluded that I am the same as him in the SPI. And all the other accounts I've had here (this one, Confluencer, KingofEdits, and LordSer8000) all count as one user when it comes to opinions for the consensus, I recognize that as would anyone reading this page. So in no way whatsoever am I manufacturing consensus, that other user commented on here fair and square based on a third opinion post you yourself initiated. It's my fault another user agrees with me and not you? Also your freudian slip comment is ridiculous, I have never had any intentions on creating more accounts to comment here, and don't plan on doing it in the future.

You legitimately seem to be having an emotional meltdown, this is embarassing to anyone who reads all your comments. Confluencerer (talk) 16:23, 24 March 2026 (UTC)

So it seems Confluencerer got banned again? And yes you’ve been banned for proxy use before btw , ,, please stop the bad faith editing. M.S. Asher (talk) 22:21, 25 March 2026 (UTC)

Alright, so, it does appear that @Confluencer/@Confluencerer/@KingofEdits103/@LordSer8000 has been banned. @M.S. Asher, was @Nosam89 your account? If so, you should disclose that on your userpage. That being said, if the other user is banned, is there anyone remaining that opposed your viewpoint?  — MWFwiki (talk) 17:57, 28 March 2026 (UTC)

Hi MWFwiki, I just added it. I've disclosed here IIRC and numerous other places but not on my talkpage, my mistake. As you can see my other account wasn't banned or suspected of anything but I lost access to it so created a new one. (It has not been active since I've had this account). I would love to hear more opinions about this article from other users but the main issue has been the limited engagement. I'm only worried because the other user has a history of proxy use. Have you taken the user Melons into account? That he was likely to be a friend or the same user as Confluencer was what Izno stated on the investigation (which I believe too but I'm not sure if you agree), that's the only account I can think of. I'll have to go back through our long conversation again otherwise. M.S. Asher (talk) 19:51, 28 March 2026 (UTC)

@M.S. Asher; Okay, thank you. I think you should make whatever changes you feel best, assuming you feel they are in-line with policy. If anyone wishes to challenge them, they can come here. We can ignore the socking as bad-faith engagement. The investigation seemed to conclude that Melons was likely a WP:MEATPUPPET vice sock, but the end-result is still the same, essentially. I find it a little odd that Melons didn't comment on the investigation. While not an official rule, either, I also take exception to an inexperienced editor attempting to provide a 3O, but that is neither here nor there.

I will refrain from reviewing the content dispute at this time, in case someone challenges your edits, I can still claim to be neutral. Just tag me if that occurs and you feel the need for a 3O.  — MWFwiki (talk) 22:02, 28 March 2026 (UTC)

Hi MWFwiki, I have edited the article. M.S. Asher (talk) 04:32, 29 March 2026 (UTC)

I did not provide a defense because I was not notified of the file until today!! It was not in my notifications until I signed in earlier today. I have only now made a defense on the investigation page. DrMelonsPhD (talk) 22:52, 31 March 2026 (UTC)

Hello, I am also a party involved here: I provided my Third Opinion Post below, although its genuinity has come under scrutiny and I am sincerely unsure why. I would like to continue contributing to these matters, although I am under apparent investigation. My desire is to continue participating in this exchange.

Presently, it says the file I am listed in is "awaiting administration and close"; as of the present, it appears to be sixth in queue. Consequently, I will refrain from making any edits as of the current moment, until this is resolved. Accordingly, I think it would be reasonable of me to ask other editors to refrain from making further edits on this specific contentious topic, wherever relevant, until my case in concluded. I think it is fair if we leave things as they are, for now. I won't touch anything. DrMelonsPhD (talk) 22:50, 31 March 2026 (UTC)

MWFwiki, would this be the time to ask for your third opinion in case? Personally I’m not convinced this isn’t socking, it’s only now with the fact that there was no response from him in the investigation being brought up by you does he suddenly respond, especially given the prior evidence. Obviously that would normally be possible but there is way too many “coincidences” that are convenient for a convicted sock-puppeteer like Confluencer. But what do you think? Either way I’d like this to be resolved as this discussion has been ongoing for almost two years now. M.S. Asher (talk) 00:06, 5 April 2026 (UTC)

We certainly don't stop editing the page simply because another editor has an open socking investigation. That is an odd request, DrMelonsPhD. If you have specific issues with the edits M.S. Asher made, raise them here and we can discuss them.  — MWFwiki (talk) 23:14, 5 April 2026 (UTC)

Hello MWFwiki. Just a quick note: following your suggestion, I added a policy argument disputing the opposing position under the "Policy Argument" section I created below.

That said, reviewing the material may convert you into a non-neutral party, as you previously alluded. Given the length and complexity of this discussion (and its history), I completely understand if you would prefer not to get involved as it would require more time than you'd probably like to devote to it. In that case, I will engage solely with M. S. Asher instead. You can feel free to disregard this message, if that is the case; consider this a courtesy tag.

Sorry for not tagging you earlier, I could not figure out how!! Lol. DrMelonsPhD (talk) 19:25, 14 June 2026 (UTC)

Hi, I don't have anything new to add at the moment. But I may in the future. LordSer8000 (talk) 04:22, 25 January 2026 (UTC)

Policy Arguments

Hello MWFwiki and M.S. Asher

First of all, the sockpuppet investigation I was weirdly entangled in has closed; as one evidently observes, I am not the sockpuppet or meatpuppet of any other user. I am not connected to any of the other accounts listed there. If I was, I would be banned; however, the case closed with my account still standing, and with no finding of fault. I am cleared of all charges. I also adhered to my promise and refrained from editing while the investigation was ongoing. I now ask that all parties cease treating me with suspicion, for fairness and civility’s sake.

Secondly, over the last little while, I have decided to take MWFwiki's advice into account and revise my approach to this matter. On the investigation page, MWF kindly advised me to consider certain policies, such as WP:OR and WP:SYNTH, in order to improve my contributions. He also emphasized the importance of grounding changes in policy here on this talk page in a response to M.S. Asher. Following those comments, I undertook a review of Wikipedia's policies and guidelines. In doing so, I came to understand that talk page discussions must principally be based on Wikipedia policy rather than on our own analyses of the sources. In light of that realization, I now have a fresh perspective that I would like to present.

As it turns out, the changes M.S. Asher/Nosam89 is seeking to make, and had made on this page, are actually forbidden by Wikipedia policy. I bring up the following three policies to prove the David Motadel conclusion must not be included at all:

1. Wikipedia:UNDUE: The Undue Weight Policy. A type of neutrality, this policy says: Neutrality requires that mainspace articles and pages fairly represent all significant viewpoints that have been published by reliable sources, in proportion to the prominence of each viewpoint in those sources. Giving due weight and avoiding giving undue weight means articles should not give minority views or aspects as much of or as detailed a description as more widely held views or widely supported aspects. Generally, the views of tiny minorities should not be included at all…

It also says: If a viewpoint is held by an extremely small minority, it does not belong on Wikipedia, regardless of whether it is true, or you can prove it, except perhaps in some ancillary article.

David Motadel’s conclusion inside Iran and the Aryan Myth is a significant minority view that is, unfortunately, outweighed by a multitude of sources arguing the opposite. On Nazi racial theories, there are at least 8 sources, from what I count, that make the claim that Iranians were officially classed as Aryans and exempted from the Nuremberg Laws by the Third Reich. If you count the sources I found, provided in my Third Opinion Post, it reaches up to 11-12 sources total.

M.S. Asher might argue that a neutral perspective, in this case, would be a one-to-one display of Motadel and the “Iranians are Aryans”/Racial Decree view, but this would be false. In light of Wikipedia:UNDUE, we are required to portray information based on majority sources and disregard extreme minority ones. Further, the argument that “Iranians were given Aryan status” is “circular reasoning,” and that this claim originates from Lenczowski, is in fact a form of Original Research; WP:OR. As Wikipedia users, it is not our job to determine where a claim finds its origins, we are only required to display the dominant academic narrative found in sources. As a matter of fact, multiple sources cross-referencing each other gives the claim MORE validity to be included as due; Motadel must be excluded because it is outweighed. In addition to this, I must note that the last draft of the article that was made was not even neutral!! It gave more weight to Motadel by discrediting the “some authors” who have made the Racial Decree claim, which is forbidden by policy. This connects to the next policy:

2. WP:FALSEBALANCE: The Balance Policy and “Equal Validity” Policy. Indeed, this also connects to WP:BALANCE. FALSEBALANCE dictates: While it is important to account for all significant viewpoints on any topic, Wikipedia policy does not state or imply that every minority view, fringe theory, or extraordinary claim needs to be presented along with commonly accepted mainstream scholarship as if they were of equal validity.

In essence, FalseBalance concerns attempts to substantiate a minority viewpoint arising from the misguided belief that an article ought to be “balanced” by giving more equal representation to opposing sides. For example, this can take the form of selectively seeking sources from a particular perspective in an effort to include them in an article so as to adjust the relative weight accorded to different viewpoints.

David Motadel’s concluding statement is by Wikipedia’s definition a fringe theory. Please look at WP:FRINGE; it is inappropriate to include Motadel’s concluding statement for the same reason articles on the Earth should not include flat earth theory as a one-to-one “neutral view.” While flat earth theory is ridiculous, for Wikipedia it must be barred from inclusion because of its fringe nature, not for any other reason. This principle extends to Motadel.

3. WP:SYNTH: The “Synthesis of Published Material” Policy, a form of Original Research. In short, it says Do not synthesize meaning from multiple sources to state or imply a conclusion not explicitly stated by any of those sources. Similarly, do not combine different parts of one source to state or imply a conclusion not explicitly stated by that source.

In the prior draft of Germany-Iran Relations, and in his reasoning on this talk page, M.S. Asher has conflated Hitler’s declaration of Iran as an “Aryan country”, found in Dilip Hiro’s book Iran under the Ayatollahs, with the Racial Decree that classed Iranians as Aryans; by extension, he connected Hiro’s claim to Motadel’s conclusion that “Iranians were never classed as Aryans under the Nazi regime.” These are two entirely different claims that find their bases in two different sources. Through his Original Research analysis, M. S. Asher has conflated and interconnected Dilip Hiro’s claim with the broader “Iranians were classed as Aryans” claim that he says originate from Lenczowski. Furthermore, his explicit description in the draft that “these claims originate from the author Lenczowski” is also completely based off Original Research, where Asher followed the origins of the claim through cross-referencing all the way back to Lenczowski. This is highly inappropriate; as Wikipedia users, we merely follow what the verifiable information is within the reliable source, seen in WP:V and WP:RS. Thus, WP:SYNTH has also been violated here.

I noticed in the debate history with Confluencer the following: M.S. Asher argued that Dilip Hiro cites Nikki R. Keddie in the bibliography, who then cites Lenczowski, in support of his “conflation” argument; but, again, this is highly inappropriate because it is Original Research. As Wikipedia users, we are restricted to only following the verifiable claims in the source, not conducting analysis.

My suggestion would be the total exclusion of Motadel; policy leaves no doubt for this.

The appropriate, policy-oriented draft would look like this, with all things considered: “In 1936, Iranians were classified as "pure-blooded Aryans" and thus were excluded from the Nuremberg Laws. Hitler himself declared Iran to be an "Aryan country."”

As a final note, I shall add this: all of the debates above between Nosam89, M.S. Asher, Confluencer and other blocked sockpuppet users are entirely based off of Original Research; this includes my Third Opinion Post as well. It seems they all were “doing it wrong,” so to speak… myself included, initially. All these above arguments can be essentially disregarded; I think my post here is the first constructive policy-oriented, proper analysis of the situation. Lastly, no further changes should be made to any affected articles involving this specific information until this matter is fully resolved, as certain policies dictate.

I believe this should settle the matter.

MWFWiki: I am open to hearing your assessment of my policy arguments. Doing so would, of course, require reviewing the entirety of the debate history to date, including the exchanges involving the other participants over the past two years. There is a considerable amount of material to review, so if you decide not to contribute further at this point, that is perfectly understandable as well; I know this is a lengthy debate that might take a lot of your time :) If you choose not to be involved, me and M.S. Asher will discuss things ourselves. Thank you!! DrMelonsPhD (talk) 19:19, 5 June 2026 (UTC)

Restoration

More Wikipedia policy research has led me to restoring the draft to Status Quo from WP:STATUSQUO. The older, long-existing draft was the pre-dispute text but it was changed during the dispute, breaching this standard. It should not have been changed. Obviously, this is also not edit warring (as stated on the QUO page) because this is my first ever edit on this page. For any involved party wanting to challenge this, read this from WP:STATUSQUO: "if the page has already been reverted to an older, pre-dispute version, then it's especially helpful if you avoid reverting to a different version." I have made this reversion now; please do not revert my change in accordance with QUO.

Looking through the edit history, the Racial Decree claim has been up on this page since 2008, for the record: https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Germany%E2%80%93Iran_relations&diff=prev&oldid=259846028

Now, Status Quo is technically not official policy, more of a suggested guideline, but I found an actual policy: WP:ONUS. This serves the same purpose, more or less, that the user seeking to include the disputed content must take things to talk page; naturally, this means the older draft stays up because the onus is on those seeking to include the "Iranians were not considered Aryan" claim to discuss the contentious matter.

Besides, MWFwiki seemingly gave M.S. Asher the authorization to change this page on the basis that the investigation admin "concluded" I am a meatpuppet; obviously that did not turn out to be the case. It is the proper act to restore things as they were; that is all I have done.

I shall also add my 3O was posted prior to the investigation; this means all disputing parties should have engaged with me before considering to make any changes; again, I cite WP:ONUS for this. Consensus must be reached before changes occur.

Thank you everyone for your professional understanding of this matter. I hope you will both continue to respect these policies; and respect to you M. S. Asher for refraining from making changes related to this content outside of this page, wherever else affected. DrMelonsPhD (talk) 21:43, 12 June 2026 (UTC)

I dont want to waste further time, this is primarily for other users since your editing here has been agreed by multiple users here as suspect and I find it very suspect, and it makes sense you’d go down this route: Motadel is a more recent view using primary sources, the others are mostly decades old or quoting Lenczowski. The “minority view” counts when its a matter of like for like scholarly analysis/equal value sources 2. The original research point is mute; I am not citing original research in the wikipedia article which is what the guidlines are primarily pertaining to, it chiefly pertained to the discussion of the reliability of the Lenczowskis work at hand and its suitability as opposed to Motadel, which I found suspect even based on secondary sources alone (pointing out that authors are citing another in their own books hardly counts as “original research” btw, I did not base that on some archival document but on books themselves) and has had more recent advanced research specifically address it. None of the other authors are in response to Motadel, rather Motadel found Lenczowskis 1940s book statement on Iranians being classified as Aryans was incorrect based on his findings. I don’t need to use primary sources for this, its clear from a basic comparison of citations between Motadels book and the others, especially Lenczowski and how his original claim dated to the 1940s and didnt cite a direct source for the claim. As for the “Hitler declaring Iranians as Aryans is totally different” nonsense, as I’ve already addressed much earlier in this conversation: No direct citation is given for this by Keddie the author, but again both of Lenczowski’s books are cited in the bibliography, so its where he almost certainly got it from as none of the other bibliography he cited contain a claim analogous to this. Regardless his wording as I mentioned before was ambiguous anyways and could very well mean that Hitlers government did (as Lenczowski said) than a personal declaration. In turn Hiro cited Keddie. I’ve supported view that the Nazis were against intermarriage with “Orientals” which they classed as being people from the Middle East as well, which includes Iran, from another published source too. And further Motadel’s article/chapter was completely dedicated to Nazi racial classifications including Iranians, whereas the other books did not give dedicated attention to the topic, which supports Motadel’s reliability further. See Wikipedia:Reliable_sources and in particular Wikipedia:AGE MATTERS and wikipedia:CONTEXTMATTERS what I have done here is broadly in line with those policies.

MWFWiki saying I should go ahead and edit the article if I felt it was in line with policy, you dont share that view but again we have at least one rogue user thats been banned here for trying to game things and force through the opinion so it wouldn’t be a shock that a suspicious user would challenge edits on whatever grounds he could argue. As was noted in the sock-puppet investigation, while no further action was taken against you in the closing the closer still agreed that your additions/activity here was suspect , so I feel no issue reverting your edits under the grounds of a weak argument on flimsy/distored use of policies (whereas you are very likely to be a sock-puppet of a banned user notorious for this editing behavior who has been engaged on this topic before) and that you are likely engaging in a bad-faith manner based on your activity and investigation, and I’m getting a clear Confluencer-style response that seems designed to forestall and draw-out the issue as long as possible with the article in its original state because of a partisan view that the article should remain the same regardless of who disagrees, and doubtless if these concerns of yours were met yet more last minute concerns and strange third-party appearances from new users would occur to kick things down the road; no wonder this debate has lasted two years. Unless MWFwiki or another experienced editor disagrees with me, although I saw no objections from him on policy towards me so far…could you weigh in MWFwiki? If this is to be taken as a serious challenge by the other user I remember you offered to intercede as a neutral party. Do you think I’ve violated these policies? M.S. Asher (talk) 04:19, 16 June 2026 (UTC)

I have reported you to WP:ANI. Briefly, however, I will address your points.

1. Wikipedia:UNDUE applies to any and all claims found within the sources. If most sources say one thing, but a singular other source says the opposite, the majority claim is implemented; it is as simple as that. There is no reason for us to believe otherwise. You have imposed your own opinion onto the policy.

2. WP:OR Original Research is permitted on talk pages, correct. However, if the rationalization of your edits have resulted from OR, or the edit itself is OR, then that is not permitted. As Wikipedia editors, we are not here to be academics ourselves. I refer to my third point under "Policy Arguments" regarding WP:SYNTH. Nothing you have said here debunks that policy argument.

3. Wikipedia:AGE MATTERS is a moot point because there are sources from 2014 (Schwanitz & Rubin), 2017 (Adib-Moghaddam), and 2022 (Dolati et al.) that make the same Racial Decree claim. Their references to Lenczowski are irrelevant based on WP:OR, although many of them do not even reference Lenczowski as I pointed out. Motadel's Iran and the Aryan Myth was published in 2013 or 2014; the dominant academic narrative has ignored Motadel and new sources agree with the Racial Decree claim. Undue Weight applies here.

Your claims of Motadel being a dedicated source, while the others were not, is also false. Schwanitz & Rubin also dedicates a section to Iran and makes the Racial Decree claim (with no reference to Lenczowski), and Ahmad Motameni's PhD dissertation titled "Iranian Philosophy of Religion and the History of Political Thought" dedicates half the dissertation to this, also making the Racial Decree claim. Thus, on a WP:CONTEXTMATTERS basis, the point still stands. Furthermore, most of the other sources give some explanation of the Racial Decree and WP:CONTEXTMATTERS says nothing about using citations from prior works.

Everything else you have said in your first paragraph is based on Original Research; it can be disregarded. We only repeat the verifiable (WP:V) claims found in reliable secondary sources and apply the majority view. You essentially repeated yourself from the original debate with Confluencer.

A Crucial Point: What you are doing here is listed under "Impermissible" within the WP:CONLEVEL Policy: A group of editors (whether or not a WikiProject) decides that relevant sitewide policies and guidelines should not apply to particular articles. Your distortions of all the policies points I listed, and your continuation of rationalizing your changes based on Original Research, are all clear demonstrations of this. You barely considered my policy arguments and mostly repeated your old arguments.

Lastly, regarding your final paragraph: I am unsure why you believe MWFwiki or "experienced editors" are these omnipotent authorities on Wikipedia where their final word will result in the application of certain information. We are a community of editors here seeking to make changes based on consensus and understanding; somebody's singular comment will not necessarily result in an immediate change. That is not how consensus-building works. Please review WP:CON. That being said, I would very much like MWFwiki to participate; I replied to him already, hoping he responds to my Policy Argument.

You have also engaged in repeated personal attacks; your final paragraph is filled with them. For whatever reason you believe WP:ONUS does not apply here, because of your suspicions and accusations; my account is standing without sanctions, and I am clearly NOT a sockpuppet!! Your actions are, unfortunately, a perversion of policy.

At this point, I will (most likely) no longer respond to you here until MWFwiki comments on the whole situation and provides his own perspective; and/or until your ANI report is concluded. DrMelonsPhD (talk) 07:18, 16 June 2026 (UTC)

Rfc: whether or not the Nazi regime officially decreed Iranians as Aryans

George Lenczowski in “Russia and the West in Iran, 1918-1948” (1949) page 160 says the Nazis declared Iranians as Aryans without citation and has been cited himself by many authors repeating this statement, Motadel and Ansari in “Perceptions of Iran” (2013) pages 135 and 145 say they didn’t, that Lenczowski was incorrect, and cite primary source documents, but have not been widely cited by other authors on this particular subject. Which can be considered correct for use in this article and others? See Talk:Germany–Iran relations#Nazis declaring Iranians Aryans/Hitler personally saying so for further discussion. Nosam89 (talk) 07:11, 11 July 2024 (UTC)

For any other editors wanting to be involved in this discussion, please read our discussion Talk:Germany–Iran relations#Nazis declaring Iranians Aryans/Hitler personally saying so in depth and take consideration of both sides. Thanks! Confluencer (talk) 17:48, 11 July 2024 (UTC)

I have revived the RFC.Nosam89 (talk) 20:02, 26 December 2024 (UTC)

I would like to contribute with my third(?) opinion. Although I do not study the Nazi regime deeply, I do come across the topic somewhat in my studies. I recently came across this topic while doing research on the Nazi and Fascist perceptions on Turks for my dissertation and saw the open 3O. I decided to do a little research into this topic out of personal interest.

After reviewing your discussion and looking at most of the sources, I find myself siding with Confluencer's assessment of the topic. In my understanding, the key point at issue here debated by both parties is the final statement from Motodel's Iran and the Aryan Myth where he concludes "Iranians were never officially classed as 'Aryans' by the Nazi regime" (page 135). I do find this extreme declaration to be somewhat faulty in light of my findings. Based on the available information, as far as I could find the evidence points to the Nazi government actually categorizing Iranians as "Aryans." I had intended to analyze the debate point-by-point, but due to my limited time I will instead focus on certain points that stuck out to me and then present some of my own reasoning, based on a little research. I present you three points:

1. Academic standpoint: The primary point Nosam89 brings up against the idea that Iranians were labeled as Aryans is Motodel’s article. I find myself siding with Confluence’s reasoning here, since Motodel does not properly engage with Lenowski’s assertion. Confluencer’s strongest point shines here: for historians and social science scholars, it is standard practice to highlight the central debate with earlier scholars at the outset of an article, laying the foundation for the argument that follows. This is significantly all the more expected when presenting a new interpretation that challenges prior consensus. Yet Motodel does not follow this approach but rather he dismisses Lenowski and a few others only in a passing footnote, unfortunately offering no real discussion. He pivots to his conclusion without ever addressing the 1936 Racial Decree claim regarding the exemption to Nuremberg Laws. Instead his entire argument rests on Walter Gross and the German Foreign Ministry’s talks with the Iranian ambassador, which touch only on one aspect of the matter, never touching upon the Reich Cabinet issue; and one could definitely argue it’s a distinct claim. This leaves open the possibility that the Decree was issued for reasons unrelated to Gross’s position and I consider that a reasonable line of interpretation and a legitimate theory.

2. Independent sources: Nosam89 argues that the issue of circular referencing is present, since many of the sources citing the “Aryanness” of Iranians directly or indirectly trace their information back to Lenczowski; yet other sources also affirm the claim and these accounts are not all tied back to Lenczowski. Stephen R. Ward’s book Immortal: A Military History of Iran and Its Armed Forces(2009) reaches this conclusion where he describes Iranians being an exception to the Nuremberg Laws as “Pure Aryans” (page 152) with no reference to Lenczowski. In addition, Schwanitz & Rubin’s Nazis, Islamists, and the Making of the Modern Middle East (2014) likewise states that the Nazis considered Iranians to be Aryans without any reference to Lenczowski (page 114; “The Nazis regarded [Iranians] as fellow Aryans”; in academia “Nazis” normally means the regime or the state). We can see that the idea does not stem from a single author but is instead supported across multiple works. Neither of these books trace their information back to Lenczowski directly or indirectly. The existence of independent scholarship detached from Lenczowski supports the point that Iranians were designated as Aryans.

3. Circumstantial evidence: Since the primary source of the Racial Decree is unavailable to both parties, or is supposedly difficult to locate, circumstantial evidence can be used to support the claim. It is well-documented that the Hitler Cabinet was notorious for destroying documents near the end of the war, so it is plausible that the original decree was lost. In such cases, historians can rely on circumstantial evidence; if logical and reliable, the claim becomes much more credible.

• i. Firstly, I have found that the Nazi regime permitted marriages between Iranians and Germans, with no record of restrictions or rejections on racial bases. While other Middle Eastern foreigners, such as Turks and Arabs (e.g. Egyptians) were technically allowed to marry Germans on paper and were given assurances that the Nuremberg Laws did not apply to them either (like Motadel alleges), in practice this was often denied on racial grounds. For example, an Egyptian doctor was barred from marrying his German fiancee because he was classified as a "Hamite." An Iraqi student, Sayd Daud Y, was barred from marrying a German woman in 1943 on racial grounds. According to Herf (2008), relationships between Arab men and German women were discouraged and often bloocked under the threat of deportation, with many applications rejected outright by the Office of Racial Politics (p.9;"the offending Arab or Turkish man"). Turks have also been prevented from marrying Germans on explicit racial grounds (Herf, 2008, p.9 see block quote). By contrast, there are no recorded instances of Iranians experiencing such racial restrictions that I could find after 1936; Schwanitz & Rubin (2014) explicitly note that Iran was the only Muslim nation declared Aryan (p.114), supporting this evidence. This proves that Iranians were held to a higher racial status because of a lack of restrictions, this being by virtue of an additional decree granting them protection from Nuremberg Laws and the local officials enforcing it. It logically aligns with a Racial Decree coming from the Reich Cabinet.
• ii. Secondly, the formal recognition of Iranians as Aryans served as the legal groundwork for Abdol Hossein Sardari’s attempts to protect Iranian Jews from the Holocaust. Sardari maintained that Jews of Iranian origin were, like other Iranians, racially Aryan. This reveals that he explicitly relied on the Nazi categorization of Iranians as Aryans and that such a classing had a legal framework behind it. Zia-Ebrahimi (2011) highlights this point explicitly in his article Self-Orientalization and Dislocation: The Uses and Abuses of the “Aryan” Discourse in Iran, which Influencer referenced in the debate. Although, I will acknowledge Zia-Ebrahimi later presents a neutral stance in the work Nosam89 cited, titled The Emergence of Iranian Nationalism, giving a neutral perspective of the scholarly debate. Nevertheless, Zia-Ebrahimi confirms the direct link between this legal basis and the protection of Iranian Jews. A book titled The Shah by Abbas Milani also says Iran used the 1936 Decree “to save Iranian Jews from the ovens of Auschwitz” (Milani, 2011, pp.67-68). If the Aryan classification had not officially been confirmed, I am not sure why Sardari would make these arguments or mention “Aryans” at all; this indicates Sardari appealed to the preconception of Iranians as Aryans by Germany. To support my point, please refer to the following example of Sardari’s rhetoric on the “Aryanity” of Iranian Jews:

“Some of the sixteen million Iranians, all brothers and sisters of the same origin and racial stock, are converts to the Mosaique faith [...] The habits, customs and morals of Mosaique Iranians are indistinguishable from those of Muslim Iranians. [...] They may have a different spiritual belief but their faces are oval with evenly distributed features, relatively low foreheads, straight noses, red or light brown lips that are often thin and frequently blue eyes [...] In other words, they are descendants of the Aryan Indo-European race, with no relationship to the European Jewish race.”

— Abdol Hossein Sardari, in an August 1942 letter to the Secretary of the German Embassy in France, Krafft von Dellmensingen

• iii. Third, some other sources I found through Wikipedia articles, such as Mohammad Rafi’s dissertation From Kulturarbeit to Gharbzadegi, note that Iranians did face discrimination in Nazi Germany before 1936 because their racial status had not yet been clarified. This included job losses of Iranian foreign nationals and the targeting of German women who married Iranians. However, after 1936, reports of any such incidents disappear, suggesting a shift in policy consistent with formal recognition of Iranians as Aryans. For other Middle Eastern nationalities, reported cases of racial discrimination persisted.

These sub-points reveal the supported existence of a 1936 Racial Decree making Iranians immune to Nuremberg Laws. In turn, these pieces of circumstantial evidence discredit Motadel's concluding statement.

The point of the Racial Decree seems to have been to accept Iranians into the "in-group" within German society legally, likely out of diplomatic flattery, while exluding other nationalities despite false assurances. The case made in both Lenzowski and Motadel can exist concurrently but only with the exception of Motadel's conclusion. The two sources (and associated sources) are not mutually exclusive. There is no need to throw out the baby with the bathwater.

As for Hitler personally declaring Iran to be an Aryan nation... I remain uncertain. The only author I have found making this assertion is Dilip Hiro. Nosam89's strongest point is on this and this statement deserves scrutiny. That said, because it appears in a recognized secondary source, I think the statement should remain included rather than deleted. As things stand, there are no published works directly disputing this point whereas at least one academic source clearly supports it. This is required by WP:TRUTH.

Apologies if this is poorly written, I spent a few hours on this and I hope my contribution helps the conversation :) Keep in mind this is something I quickly whipped up based on sources I found through Wikipedia and I only quickly reviewed them; my external research was minimal. I am NOT a professional in this topic ~ Thank you!! DrMelonsPhD (talk) 06:18, 22 January 2026 (UTC)

There are alot of issues with your reply. Firstly, there is no proof Middle Easterners were ever allowed to marry Germans even “on paper”, it is simply a case that the law was described to Middle Eastern ambassadors in a manner to avoid offense. Lenczowski never gives any evidence at all for their being a provision for Iranians being Aryans, he gives no source either for it. Simple as that. It’s disingenuous to say that he only mentioned it in a footnote without dealing with any decree itself…because the point is that there was no decree! Mor evidence for it. The sources you provided are again mostly recycled from the discussion; the circular attempts to try to get Lenczowski to agree with it self by citing other authors who give no evidence and track their genesis to him is also disingenuous. There rest is merely an opinion piece devoid of evidence from someone that is almost certainly the same user ive been interacting with and is constantly using these tactics to throw things off track, see Wikipedia:Sockpuppet investigations/Confluencerist

where the investigation concluded that this was likely. M.S. Asher (talk) 07:18, 24 March 2026 (UTC)

Rfc: whether or not the Nazi regime officially decreed Iranians as Aryans…(cont.)

(Copied from above to revive RFC) George Lenczowski in “Russia and the West in Iran, 1918-1948” (1949) page 160 says the Nazis declared Iranians as Aryans without citation and has been cited himself by many authors repeating this statement, Motadel and Ansari in “Perceptions of Iran” (2013) pages 135 and 145 say they didn’t, that Lenczowski was incorrect, and cite primary source documents, but have not been widely cited by other authors on this particular subject. Which can be considered correct for use in this article and others? See Talk:Germany–Iran relations#Nazis declaring Iranians Aryans/Hitler personally saying so for further discussion (my insert: This dispute concerns multiple pages)). Nosam89 (talk) 00:17, 5 January 2025 (UTC)

This RfC might be DoA. I urge you, instead of posting it again please do your absolute best to follow all of the Creating an RfC instructions.

First, consider some of the alternatives. I don't think this is quite at the level of needing Dispute Resolution, but you might try getting a Third Opinion or reaching out to subject matter experts at relevant WikiProjects.

If you do keep with an RfC, please try your hardest to whittle the request down to a single concise question. It is unclear what the ultimate request is. I think you are asking whether or not the claim that the Nazis declared Iranians as Aryans should be in the article, and if so with what citation and context. Asking editors to immediately read a tome-length discussion will turn most people away, but you should advise they read it for the best overview, perhaps highlighting key parts of the conversation. Also, please use the {{rfc}} tag to strongly give the impression you are hoping to resolve the issue in the end. Ender and Peter 04:38, 9 January 2025 (UTC)

Sorry I have a new account now I lost access to the old one. In fact I did have a rfc tag, but it got removed. Please see

I gave a short description but unfortunately it involves circular sourcing across numerous books and its a complicated subject, how exactly can I talk about it without getting into that? The other user requested that I revive the rfc Wikipedia:Writing requests for comment gives no guidance on how to do so I did how I thought I would be done. Anyone who wants to understand the issue will need to do some reading, I gave my best summary at the beginning. - M.S. Asher (talk) 20:21, 18 September 2025 (UTC)

• I'll chime in. This is a clear case of Wikipedia:When sources are wrong. Wikipedia also prefers recently published book over old books. Lenczowski's book was published over 70 years ago. Nosam89's argument stands until another reliable source disproves Ansari's book's claim. I've confirmed "Perception of Iran" book myself. 68.187.65.220 (talk) 01:10, 13 February 2025 (UTC)

The only person that has weighed in has agreed with me, and no one has posted here in seven months. I think its appropriate, while keeping the other sources in, to point out that Motadel has shown the claim that the Nazis declared iranians as Aryans is false (and the claim that Hitler did so personally). That allows people to still see the other POV that the other user advocates and going to the sources to make up their own mind, while still reflecting that Motadel has debunked this claim. M.S. Asher (talk) 22:15, 18 September 2025 (UTC)

A simple 2v1 disagreement, without any rationale or in-depth explanation from the other user weighing in on the discussion, is not sufficient to declare a consensus has been reached. Until then, the last draft should be left up until more users weigh in on the matter. Can you revive the RFC this time but for a longer period, and make it so it doesn't expire quickly? That would be useful. Anyway, please continue discussing things here until a resolution is reached. Thanks. LordSer8000 (talk) 03:21, 19 September 2025 (UTC)

I take it this is confluencer again in a new account? What composes “an in-depth argument”? I made a somewhat in-depth argument myself, another user weighed in and agreed and gave brief reasons why. I see nothing on wikipedia guideline's about this. And the user gave VERY CLEAR rationale. Wikipedia:Neutral point of view needs to be taken into account at this point for this discussion as well; this article is showing only sources pointing one way despite more recent work pointing the other way. However, I would love more people to weigh in, but that apparently isn’t happening. I didnt make the rfc expire either or have an effect on it, someone removed it. Perhaps you could start your own rfc? - M.S. Asher (talk) 04:30, 20 September 2025 (UTC)

I am simply stating we need more discussion that addresses the complexity of the topic. You also state "I gave a more in depth argument than you did", but I can (and do) say the exact same thing about my rationale and explanations. Also, I'm not "blocking" anything. The user that has the dispute must discuss the matter on the talk page and reach consensus to implement their changes deemed controversial to the last draft (you initiated the dispute last year). Another user "Czello" already told you this. I am simply leaving up the POV that was there before, all of which is sourced with multiple sources backing it up.

My suggestion: let more time pass and allow other users to offer their perspectives. It might take some time, but that's okay. Once a handful of more users have offered their perspectives (with proper in-depth explanations), we can implement the consensus. LordSer8000 (talk) 04:43, 20 September 2025 (UTC)

Sure, I can attempt to start my own RFC. I'll look into how to make a longer-lasting one and try and implement it soon. LordSer8000 (talk) 04:46, 20 September 2025 (UTC)

I had already edited my post by the time you responded to tone it down just for your information, although my point is that what is a more “in-depth” argument is entirely pedantic, but if you were saying it was not in depth because it was brief my posts were even longer than yours, what would be the point of that? Nor can I find guidlines in how many users makes a consensus. But thank you for offering to post the rfc instead. I saw no guidance for this on the guidelines. Also who is Czello? I dont see them in the edit history. M.S. Asher (talk) 04:52, 20 September 2025 (UTC)

No problem, it's all good. It might take time, but I'm sure we will get to the bottom of this eventually. LordSer8000 (talk) 04:54, 20 September 2025 (UTC)

Are you still going to start the rfc? M.S. Asher (talk) 17:36, 13 October 2025 (UTC)

Yes I will. I still need to research how to do it and hopefully come up with a good one. I've just been super busy recently. I'll start one soon, in the near future. LordSer8000 (talk) 23:10, 15 October 2025 (UTC)