The aim of this study is to develop an efficient iterative approach for solving a class of time-delay optimal control problems with time-varying delay and external persistent disturbances. By using the internal model principle, the original time-delay model with disturbance is first converted into an augmented system without any disturbance. Then, we select a quadratic performance index for the augmented system to form an undisturbed time-delay optimal control problem. The necessary optimality conditions are then derived in terms of a two-point boundary value problem involving advance and delay arguments. Finally, a fast iterative algorithm is designed for the latter advance-delay boundary value problem. The convergence of the new iterative technique is also investigated. Numerical simulations verify that the proposed approach is efficient and provides satisfactory results.