The expulsion of the New York Times reporter in Iran would seem to indicate that Premier Mossadegh learned a few things in the course of his several weeks’ stay in Washington. [Michael Clark] The correspondent has been handed his walking papers because his newspaper published news and advertisements that did not suit the Iranian government. That is further than President Truman ventured but not a bit further than he would like to go.

There is no basic difference between the ouster of the Times correspondent in Teheran and the unwarranted censure heaped on news writers, in Korea and on the home front, by Mr. Truman. There is a difference in the two countries; that is all. Iran is a backward land ruled by feudalistic despots and the United States is still a free country. Given time, Mr. Truman will eliminate the difference.

For Premier Mossadegh and President Truman share identical views. They profess to support the democratic principles typified in a free press. But they will not tolerate publication of material that does not suit their fancy. Whenever the printed truth hurts both Mr. Truman and Premier Mossadegh react violently. Both demand a scapegoat and both cast the free press in that role.

President Truman not long ago clamped down censorship on his own Cabinet and department heads under the pretext of security. Secret military matters were being published, said Mr. Truman, and the news writers and the editors and the publishers there were guilty of either stupidity or disloyalty. The fact that nothing was printed except material handed out by authorized and presumably responsible officials of the government carried no weight with the President.

And when correspondents in Korea described what happened before their eyes, clearing their messages with military censors, President Truman complained bitterly. Fighting stopped in Korea and the cessation resulted from orders to the combat troops, orders that were quoted in American publications. In the face of this evidence, Mr. Truman reprimanded the war correspondents, denied their stories and tried hard to hold them up to scorn.

The expulsion of the Times man in Iran is curiously similar. Back in the last days of last month this reporter cabled his newspaper that Dr. Mossadegh won unanimous approval of legislation the Iranian parliament had earlier rejected because the individual legislators were terrified. The statement was true. Everyone knows that assassination is a very real and present danger throughout the Middle East. Ironically enough, the very terrorism the news writer mentioned broke loose on the day his expulsion was announced. Communist mobs battled police and soldiers in the streets of the capital and Nationalist fanatics took up the riot where the Reds left off, attacking persons opposing Dr. Mossadegh’s regime and destroying their property.

An enlightening note is contained in the Times man’s expulsion. This formal paper cites not alone his news story but also a full page advertisement in the same issue bought by the British owners of the expropriated Iran oil property. Dr. Mossadegh plainly cannot stomach criticism any more than Mr. Truman. The Iranian chief of state is aping the Truman way of dealing with the truth, and elaborating on it.