A fluent Farsi speaker, Harney was a foreign observer in Iran in the years leading up to the revolution, where he enjoyed intimate access to the inner circle of the Shah, but failed to anticipate his eventual overthrow.

[2] After leaving Durham, Harney embarked on postgraduate studies in Geography at St Catharine's College, Cambridge, but ultimately left early without taking a degree.

[6] He regarded the Shah as personally flawed, but nevertheless saw him as an effective administrator, apparently underestimating the degree to which his modernisation policies had alienated more traditional elements of Persian society.

[5] He was discouraged from attempting such relationships, as the British government did not wish to offend the Shah and relied on SAVAK, the state security service, for the bulk of its reporting on Iranian politics.

[7] Among them was a file belonging to Arthur Callaghan, the former CIA station chief, which mentioned Harney as a trusted contact and described him as a British intelligence officer with a nominal job as a Morgan Grenfell banker.

[7] Harney held ambitions to secure a seat in the House of Commons, but his advancing age counted against him and he failed to be selected as a Conservative Party candidate.