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Iran hostage crisis
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The Iran hostage crisis was a diplomatic crisis between Iran and the United States where 52 U.S. diplomats were held hostage for 444 days from November 4, 1979 to January 20, 1981, after a group of Islamist students took over the American embassy in support of the Iranian revolution.
The crisis has been described as an entanglement of "vengeance and mutual incomprehension".
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The Iran hostage crisis was a diplomatic crisis between Iran and the United States where 52 U.S. diplomats were held hostage for 444 days from November 4, 1979 to January 20, 1981, after a group of Islamist students took over the American embassy in support of the Iranian revolution.
The crisis has been described as an entanglement of "vengeance and mutual incomprehension". In Iran, the incident was seen by many as a blow against the U.S., its influence in Iran, its perceived attempts to undermine the Iranian Revolution, and its long standing support of the recently overthrown Shah of Iran, Mohammad Reza Pahlavi. The Shah had been restored to power in a 1953 coup with some assistance from the CIA
and had recently been allowed into the United States for cancer treatment. In the United States, the hostage-taking was seen as an outrage violating a centuries-old principle of international law granting diplomats immunity from arrest and diplomatic compounds sovereignty in their embassies.
The ordeal reached a climax when after failed attempts to negotiate a release, the United States military attempted a rescue operation, Operation Eagle Claw, on April 24, 1980, which resulted in an aborted mission, the crash of two aircraft and the deaths of eight American military men and one Iranian civilian. The crisis ended with the signing of the Algiers Accords in Algeria on January 19, 1981. The hostages were formally released into United States custody the following day, just minutes after the new American president Ronald Reagan was sworn in.
The crisis has been described as the "pivotal episode" in the history of U.S.-Iranian relations. In America, it is thought by some political analysts to be the primary reason for U.S. President Jimmy Carter's defeat in the November 1980 presidential election. In Iran, the crisis strengthened the prestige of the Ayatollah Khomeini and the political power of forces who supported theocracy and opposed any reconciliation with the West. The crisis also marked the beginning of American legal action, or economic sanctions against Iran, that weakened economic ties between Iran and America.
Background
1953 coup
In February less than a year before the crisis, Mohammad Reza Pahlavi, the Shah of Iran, had been overthrown in an Islamist nationalist revolution. For several decades before that, the United States had been an ally and backer of the Shah. During World War II, Allied powers Britain and the Soviet Union occupied Iran to prevent it from allying with the Axis Powers, and installed Mohammad Reza Pahlavi on the throne. After WWII and during the Cold War, Iran allied itself with the U.S. against the Soviet Union, Iran’s neighbor and occasional enemy and occupier, and America provided the Shah's regime with military and economic aid.
In the early 1950s, America helped the Shah regain power in a struggle with a nationalist Prime Minister, Mohammed Mosaddeq. Mosaddeq had nationalized Iran’s foreign-owned and -managed oil producer, the Anglo-Iranian Oil Company, a highly popular move in Iran but, in response, the company’s furious British owners withdrew employees and ceased oil production, which seriously harmed Iran's economy. In its Cold War solidarity with the UK, the American government refused to break the UK boycott, and insisted Iran negotiate with Britain. As domestic dissatisfaction grew, so did American concern about Soviet influence in Iran. Working with Iranian opponents of Mosaddeq, in 1953 the CIA and British intelligence launched Operation Ajax, orchestrating a coup d’état to overthrow the elected prime minister and replace him with a pro-Western one. In subsequent decades this foreign intervention, along with other economic, cultural and political issues, united opposition against the Shah and led to his overthrow.
Carter administration
Shortly before the revolution on New Years day 1978, American president Jimmy Carter further angered anti-Shah Iranians with a televised toast to the Shah, declaring how beloved the Shah was by his people. After the revolution in February, the embassy had been occupied and staff held hostage briefly. Rocks and bullets had broken enough of the embassy front-facing windows for them to be replaced with bullet-proof glass. Its staff was reduced to just over 60 from a high of nearly 1000 earlier in the decade.
The Carter administration attempted to mitigate the anti-American feeling by finding a new relationship with the de facto Iranian government and by continuing military cooperation in hopes that the situation would stabilize. However, on October 22, 1979 the U.S. permitted the Shah - who was ill with cancer - to attend the Mayo Clinic for medical treatment. The American embassy in Tehran had discouraged the request, understanding the political delicacy, but after pressure from influential figures including former United States Secretary of State Henry Kissinger and Council on Foreign Relations chairman David Rockefeller, the Carter administration decided to grant the Shah’s request.
The Shah's admission to the US intensified Iranian revolutionaries anti-Americanism and spawned rumors of another U.S.-backed coup and re-installation of the Shah.
Revolutionary leader Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini - who had been exiled by the Shah for 15 years - heightened rhetoric against the “Great Satan”, the United States, talking of what he called “evidence of American plotting.”
The hostage takers were “convinced that the embassy was a center of opposition to the new government” and thus their action was connected to the 1953 U.S.-backed coup against the democratically-elected government of Prime Minister Mosaddeq. One of the hostage takers told Bruce Laingen, chief U.S. diplomat in Iran at the time,
"You have no right to complain, because you took our whole country hostage in 1953.” In addition to putting an end to what they believed was American plotting and sabotage against the revolution, the hostage takers hoped to depose the provisional revolutionary government of Prime Minister Mehdi Bazargan which they believed was plotting to normalize relations with the United States and extinguish Islamic revolutionary ardor in Iran.
A later study found that there had been no plots for the overthrow of the revolutionaries by the United States, and that a CIA intelligence gathering mission at the embassy was “notably ineffectual, gathering little information and hampered by the fact that none of the three officers spoke the local language, Persian.” Its work was “routine, prudent espionage conducted at diplomatic missions everywhere.”
Planning
The seizure of the American embassy was initially planned in September 1979 by Ebrahim Asgharzadeh, a student at that time. He consulted with the heads of the Islamic associations of Tehran’s main universities, including the University of Tehran, Sharif University of Technology, Amirkabir University of Technology (Polytechnic of Tehran) and Iran University of Science and Technology. Their group was named Muslim Student Followers of the Imam's Line.
Asgharzadeh later said there were five students at the first meeting, two of whom wanted to target the Soviet embassy because the USSR was “a Marxist and anti-God regime.” But two others, Mirdamadi and Habibolah Bitaraf, supported Asgharzadeh’s chosen target — the United States. "Our aim was to object against the American government by going to their embassy and occupying it for several hours," Asgharzadeh said. "Announcing our objections from within the occupied compound would carry our message to the world in a much more firm and effective way." Mirdamadi told an interviewer, "we intended to detain the diplomats for a few days, maybe one week, but no more." Masoumeh Ebtekar, spokeswoman for the Iranian students during the crisis, said that those who rejected Asgharzadeh's plan did not participate in the subsequent events.
The Islamist students observed the security procedures of the U.S. Marine guards from nearby rooftops overlooking the embassy. They also used experiences from the recent revolution, during which the U.S. embassy grounds were briefly occupied. They enlisted the support of police in charge of guarding the embassy and of Islamic Revolutionary Guards.
According to the group and other sources Khomeini did not know of the plan before hand. The Islamist students had wanted to inform him but according to author Mark Bowden, Ayatollah Musavi Khoeyniha persuaded them not to. Khoeyniha feared the government would use police to expel the Islamist students as they had the last occupiers in February. The provisional government had been appointed by Khomeini and so Khomeini was likely to go along with their request to restore order. On the other hand, Khoeyniha knew that if Khomeini first saw that the occupiers were his faithful supporters (unlike the leftists in the first occupation) and that large numbers of pious Muslims had gathered outside the embassy to show their support for the takeover, it would be "very hard, perhaps even impossible", for the Imam Khomeini to oppose the takeover, and this would paralyze the Bazargan administration Khoeyniha and the students wanted to eliminate.
Takeover
Around 6:30 a.m. on November 4, the ringleaders gathered between 300 and 500 selected students, thereafter known as Muslim Student Followers of the Imam's Line, and briefed them on the battle plan. A female student was given a pair of metal cutters to break the chains locking the embassy's gates, and she hid them beneath her chador.
At first the students' plan to only make a symbolic occupation, release statements to the press and leave when government security forces came to restore order, was reflected in placards saying `Don't be afraid. We just want to set-in`. When the embassy guards brandished firearms, the protesters retreated, one telling the Americans, `We don't mean any harm.` But as it became clear the guards would not use deadly force and that a large angry crowd had gathered outside the coumpound to cheer the occupiers and jeer the hostages, the occupation changed. According to one embassy staff member, buses full of demonstrators began to appear outside the embassy shortly after the Muslim Student Followers of the Imam's Line broke through the gates.
As Ayatollah Musavi Khoeyniha had hoped, Khomeini supported the takeover. According to Foreign Minister Ebrahim Yazdi, when he, Yazdi came to Qom to tell The Imam about the incident, Khomeini told the minister to "go and kick them out." But later that evening, back in Tehran, the minister heard on the radio that Imam Khomeini had issued a statement supporting the seizure and calling it "the second revolution," and the embassy an "American spy den in Tehran."
The occupiers bound and blindfolded the embassy soldiers and staff and paraded them in front of photographers. In the first couple of days many of the embassy staff who had snuck out of the compound or not been there at the time of the takeover were rounded up by Islamists and returned as hostages. Six American diplomats did however avoid capture and found refuge at the nearby Canadian and Swiss embassies in Tehran for three months. They fled Iran using Canadian passports on January 28, 1980.
444 days hostage
Hostage-holding motivations
The Muslim Student Followers of the Imam's Line demanded that the Shah be returned to Iran for trial and execution. The U.S. maintained that the Shah, who died less than a year later in July 1980, had come to America only for medical attention. The group's other demands included that the U.S. government apologize for its interference in the internal affairs of Iran and for the overthrow of Prime Minister Mossadeq, and that Iran's frozen assets in the U.S. be released.
The initial takeover plan was to hold the embassy for only a short time, but this changed after it became apparent how popular the takover was and that Khomeini had given it his full support. Some attribute the Iranian decision not to release the hostages quickly to U.S. President Jimmy Carter's "blinking" or failure to immediately deliver an ultimatum to Iran. His immediate response was to appeal for the release of the hostages on humanitarian grounds and to share his hopes of a strategic anti-communist alliance with the Islamic Republic. As some of the student leaders had hoped, Iran's moderate prime minister Mehdi Bazargan and his cabinet resigned under pressure just days after the event.
The duration of the hostages' captivity has been blamed on internal Iranian revolutionary politics. As Ayatollah Khomeini told Iran's president:
This action has many benefits. ... This has united our people. Our opponents do not dare act against us. We can put the constitution to the people's vote without difficulty, and carry out presidential and parliamentary elections.
Theocratic Islamists, as well as leftist political groups and figures like leftist People's Mujahedin of Iran, supported the taking of American hostages as an attack on "American imperialism" and its alleged Iranian "tools of the West." Revolutionary teams displayed secret documents taken from the embassy, sometimes painstakingly reconstructed after shredding, to buttress their claim that "the Great Satan" (the U.S.) was trying to destabilize the new regime, and that Iranian moderates were in league with the U.S. (The documents were published in a series of books called "Documents from the US Espionage Den" . These books included telegrams, correspondence, and reports from the U.S. State Department and Central Intelligence Agency.)
By embracing the hostage-taking under the slogan "America can't do a thing," Khomeini rallied support and deflected criticism from his controversial Islamic theocratic constitution, which was due for a referendum vote in less than one month. Following the successful referendum, both leftists and theocrats continued to use the issue of alleged pro-Americanism to suppress their opponents, the relatively moderate political forces, which included the Iranian Freedom Movement, National Front, Grand Ayatollah Shari'atmadari, and later President Abolhassan Banisadr. In particular, carefully selected diplomatic dispatches and reports discovered at the embassy and released by the hostage takers led to the disempowerment and resignations of moderate figures such as Premier Mehdi Bazargan. The political danger in Iran of any move seen as accommodating America, along with the failed rescue attempt, delayed a negotiated release. After the hostages were released, leftists and theocrats turned on each other, with the stronger theocratic group decimating the left.
Hostage conditions
The hostage-takers, declaring their solidarity with other "oppressed minorities" and "the special place of women in Islam," released 13 women and blacks in the middle of November 1979, leaving only one black and two women hostages. One more hostage, Richard Queen, was released in July 1980 after he was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis. The remaining 52 hostages were held captive until January 1981.
Although the hostage takers declared that the hostages were actually "guests of the Ayatollah", the treatment the "guests" received was not always gracious. They were often paraded blindfolded before local crowds and television cameras, "experienced long periods of solitary confinement and for months were forbidden to speak to one another." Michael Metrinko was kept in handcuffs for 24 hours a day for two weeks after insulting the Ayatollah Khomeini.
The most terrifying night for the hostages came on February 5, 1980, when guards in black ski masks rousted the 53 hostages from their sleep and led them blindfolded to other rooms. They were searched after being ordered to strip to their underwear and keep their hands up. The mock execution ended after the guards cocked their weapons and readied them to fire but finally ejected their rounds and told the prisoners to pull up their pants. The hostages were later told the exercise was "just a joke" and something the guards "had wanted to do."
After the mock execution, the hostages were never threatened again with death by their guards and endured the less intense pains of homesickness, boredom and confinement: "Forcing grown men to live together in a small space day and night, month after month, is a form of slow torture. ... opinions become deadly and anything can provoke argument." Guards would often withhold mail from home, telling one hostage (Charles W. Scott) "I don't see anything for you, Mr. Scott. Are you sure your wife has not found another man?"
During the hostage crisis, several foreign diplomats and ambassadors including Canadian ambassador Ken Taylor came to visit the American hostages. The diplomats and ambassadors helped the American government stay in contact with the American hostages. Through these meetings with foreign governments, the "Laingen dispatches," made by hostage Bruce Laingen, were conveyed to the American government.
In America
In the United States, the hostage-taking is said to have created "a surge of patriotism" and left "the American people more united than they have been on any issue in two decades." The action was seen "not just as a diplomatic affront," but as a "declaration of war on diplomacy itself." Television news gave daily updates. President Carter applied economic and diplomatic pressure on Iran: oil imports from Iran were ended on November 12, 1979, and through the issuance of Executive Order 12170, around US$8 billion of Iranian assets in the U.S. were frozen by the Office of Foreign Assets Control on November 14.
During the weeks leading up to Christmas in 1979, high school students created Christmas cards that were delivered to the hostages in Iran. This was then replicated by community groups across the country, resulting in bales of Christmas cards delivered to the hostages. The White House Christmas Tree that year was left dark except for the top star.
A severe backlash against Iranians in the US developed. One Iranian later complained, "I had to hide my Iranian identity not to get beaten up, even at university." Many Iranians in the U.S. were also expelled.
According to author/journalist Mark Bowden, a pattern developed in Pres. Carter's attempts to negotiate a release of the hostages: Carter would latch on to a deal proffered by a top Iranian official and grant minor but humiliating concessions, only to have it scotched at the last minute by Khomeini.
Canadian Caper
On the day the hostages were seized, six American diplomats evaded capture and remained in hiding at the Swiss and Canadian embassies. In 1979, the Canadian Parliament held a secret session for the first time since World War II in order to pass special legislation allowing Canadian passports to be issued to some American citizens so that they could escape. Six American diplomats boarded a flight to Zürich, Switzerland, on January 28, 1980. Their escape and rescue from Iran by Canadian ambassador Ken Taylor has come to be known as the Canadian Caper.
Rescue attempts
After rejecting Iranian demands, Carter approved an ill-fated secret rescue mission, Operation Eagle Claw. Late in the afternoon of April 24, eight RH-53D helicopters flew from the aircraft carrier USS Nimitz toward a remote landing site (really just a desert road) serving as an airstrip in the Great Salt Desert of Eastern Iran, near Tabas. Early the next morning six of the eight RH-53D helicopters met up with several waiting C-130 transport and refueling airplanes at the landing site and refueling area, designated "Desert One" by the mission.
Of the two helicopters that did not make it to Desert One, one suffered avionics failures en route and returned to the USS Nimitz, and the other had an indication that one of its main rotor blades was fractured, and was abandoned in the desert en route to Desert One. Its crew was seen and retrieved by another helicopter that continued to Desert One. The helicopters maintained strict radio silence under orders for the entire flight, an issue which impacted their ability to maintain a cohesive flying unit while en route, as they all arrived separately and behind schedule. The strict radio silence also prevented them from requesting permission to fly above the sandstorm as the C-130s had done, and they flew the entire route at hazardous low levels, even while inside the sandstorm and with limited field of vision and erratic instrumentation.
The mission plan called for a minimum of six helicopters but of the six that made it to Desert One, one had a failed primary hydraulics system and had flown on the secondary hydraulics system for the previous four hours.
The failing helicopter's crew wanted to continue, but due to the increased risk of not having a backup hydraulic system during flight, the helicopter squadron's commander decided to ground the helicopter. The Delta commander, Col. Beckwith, then recommended the mission be aborted and his recommendation was approved by President Carter. As the helicopters repositioned themselves for refueling, one helicopter landed on top of a C-130 tanker aircraft and crashed, killing eight U.S. servicemen and injuring several more.
After the mission and its failure were made known, Khomeini's prestige skyrocketed in Iran as he credited divine intervention on behalf of Islam for the result. Iranian officials who favored release of the hostages, such as President Bani Sadr, were weakened. In America, President Carter's political popularity and prospects for being reelected in 1980 were further damaged after a April 25 television address in which he explaining the rescue operation.
A second rescue attempt that was planned but never attempted used highly modified YMC-130H Hercules aircraft. Outfitted with rocket thrusters fore and aft to allow an extremely short landing and takeoff in the Shahid Shiroudi soccer stadium located close to the embassy, three aircraft were modified under a rushed super-secret program known as Operation Credible Sport. One aircraft crashed during a demonstration at Duke Field at Eglin Air Force Base Auxiliary Field 3 on October 29, 1980, when its landing braking rockets were fired too soon. The misfire caused a hard touchdown that tore off the starboard wing and started a fire; all on board survived. The impending change in the White House following the November election led to an abandonment of this project. The two surviving airframes were returned to regular duty with the rocket packages removed. One is at the Museum of Aviation located next to Robins Air Force Base in Georgia.
The aforementioned failed rescue attempt led to the creation of the 160th S.O.A.R., a helicopter aviation special forces group in the United States Army.
Final months
The death of the Shah on July 27 and the invasion of Iran by Iraq in September 1980 may have made Iran more receptive to the idea of resolving the hostage crisis. Ronald Reagan defeated Jimmy Carter in the November 1980 presidential election but Carter continued to attempt to negotiate the release of the hostages through Secretary of State Warren Christopher, Algerian intermediaries and members of the Iranian government in the final days of his presidency.
In the waning days of Carter's Presidency, Algerian diplomat Abdulkarim Ghuraib opened fruitful negotiations between the U.S. and Iran. This resulted in the "Algiers Accords" of January 19, 1981. The Algiers Accords called for Iran's immediate freeing of the hostages, the unfreezing of $7.9 billion of Iranian assets and immunity from lawsuits Iran might have faced in America, and a pledge by the United States that "it is and from now on will be the policy of the United States not to intervene, directly or indirectly, politically or militarily, in Iran's internal affairs."
On January 20, 1981, minutes after Reagan was sworn in as President, the American hostages were released by Iran into U.S. custody, having spent 444 days in captivity. The hostages were flown to Algeria as a symbolic gesture for the help of that government in resolving the crisis. The flight continued to Rhein-Main Air Base in West Germany, where former President Carter, acting as emissary, received them. After medical check-ups and debriefings, they took a second flight to Stewart Air National Guard Base in Newburgh, New York, with a refueling stop in Shannon, Ireland, where they were greeted by a large crowd. From Newburgh they traveled by bus to the United States Military Academy, receiving a heroes' welcome all along the route. Ten days after their release, the former hostages were given a ticker tape parade through the Canyon of Heroes in New York City.
Aftermath
Iran–Iraq War
The Iraq invasion of Iran occurred less than a year after the embassy employees were taken hostage. At least one observer (Stephen Kinzer) believes the dramatic change of US-Iranian relations from ally to enemy played a part in emboldening Saddam Hussein to invade, and US anger with Iran led the US to aid Iraq after the war turned against Iraq. The US supplied Iraq with, among other things, "helicopters and satellite intelligence that was used in selecting bombing targets". In turn, this aid and the shooting down of Iran Air Flight 655 in the Persian Gulf by the USS Vincennes "deepened and widened anti-American feeling in Iran."
Iran
The hostage taking was unsuccessful for the Islamic Republic in some respects. Iran lost international support for its war against Iraq, and the settlement was considered almost wholly favorable to the United States since it did not meet any of Iran's original demands. But the crisis strengthened Iranians who supported the hostage taking. Anti-Americanism became even more intense, and anti-American rhetoric continued unabated. Politicians such as Musavi-Khoeniha and Behzad Nabavi were left in a stronger position, while those associated or accused of association with America were removed from the political picture. Khomeini biographer Baqer Moin describes the incident as "a watershed in Khomeini's life" transforming him from a "cautious, pragmatic politician" into "a modern revolutionary, single-mindedly pursing a dogma". In his statements, "imperialism, liberalism, democracy" were "negative words", while "revolution ... became a sacred word, sometimes more important than Islam."
America
In America, gifts were showered upon the hostages upon their return, including lifetime passes to any minor league or Major League Baseball game.
In 2000, the hostages and their families tried to sue Iran, unsuccessfully, under the Antiterrorism Act. They originally won the case when Iran failed to provide a defense, but the U.S. State Department tried to put an end to the suit, fearing that it would make international relations difficult. As a result, a federal judge ruled that nothing could be done to repay the damages the hostages faced because of the agreement the U.S. made when the hostages were freed.
The US embassy building is used by Iran's government and its affiliated groups. The Guardian reported in 2006 that a group called The Committee for the Commemoration of Martyrs of the Global Islamic Campaign used the US embassy to recruit "martyrdom seekers", volunteers to carry out operations against Western and Jewish targets. Mohammad Samadi, a spokesman for the group, signed up several hundred volunteers in a few days.
Conspiracy theories
Alleged Rockefeller plot
One conspiratorial explanation for the hostage taking is that David Rockefeller plotted to allow the Shah to enter America knowing this would provoke the Islamic revolutionaries into "some kind of outrageous" response, which in turn would provoke a retaliation by the American government of freezing Iranian assets kept in Rockefeller's Chase Manhattan Bank. This would help replace loans made by Chase Manhattan to the Shah that the Islamic government had no intention of repaying. The theory is mentioned by roozonline and in the book Taken Hostage, by David Farber
Other alleged plots
In Iran the failed rescue attempt was described by revolutionaries not as an attempt to free the hostages but as a `secret invasion` by hundreds of American troops "to murder Khomeini and destroy the revolution." American hostages were told that America had sent commandos to Iran to kill them, and that the hostages had been moved to prison cells for their own protection.
Alleged CIA plot
Journalist Mark Bowden writes that since the hostage taking "helped prompt the disastrous Iran-Iraq War and 25 years of international troubles for Iran," it is now much less popular in Iran. Conspiracy theorists such as "Reza Ghapour, a young fundamentalist `scholar`" and Abolhassan Banisadr argue the hostage taking "was a secret CIA plot" and that the student hostage takers were "either stooges or, at worst, American agents." In Iran their theories are "taken seriously" by "even well-educated people."
October Surprise conspiracy theory
The October Surprise theory refers to a purported deal between high-level Reagan campaign operatives and representatives of the Iranian Islamic government to delay the release of the hostages until after the November 1980 U.S. elections. The delay would hurt Reagan's opponent incumbent President Carter, as the hostage taking occured on his watch and Carter had been seen to invest much effort into getting the hostages released. Although investigations by the United States Senate and House of Representatives in the 1990s declared the allegations to be unfounded, the conspiracy's existence or lack thereof remains a subject of debate. The main cause for suspicion was the seeming coincidence of his inauguration and the hostages' release six minutes after Reagan was sworn into office on January 20, 1981, as well as the Reagan administration's later decision to provide arms to the anti-U.S. Iranian government, allegedly in return not for freeing the hostages, but for delaying their release.
However, special ops personnel involved in the preparations for the second rescue attempt believed that incoming President Ronald Reagan was involved in the planning and timing of the second rescue attempt, and that these intentions were either implied or made known to the de facto Iranian government, leading to the hostages' release just minutes after Reagan's inauguration.
Long Term effect
Some doubt the hostage crisis will have a long term effect on US-Iranian relations. Journalist Robert Kaplan argues that those who believe relations between the two countries "will never be restored because of the hostage crisis .... ignore history," and compares the hostage taking to a 19th century Iranian attack on the Russian embassy. In 1829, ... Iranians ... stormed and destroyed the Russian embassy and decapitated the Russian ambassador, Alexander Griboyedov. But Russian-Iranian relations were eventually restored. Who, now, even remembers the incident?
Hostages
November 4, 1979 - January 20, 1981 - 66 original captives - 63 from and held at Embassy, three from and held at Foreign Ministry Office.
At least three of the hostages were operatives of the CIA.
Thirteen hostages were released from November 19-20, 1979, and one was released on July 11, 1980. Fifty-two remaining hostages endured 444 days of captivity until their release (announced across the Capitol grounds twenty minutes after the swearing in of the new President) on Reagan's Inauguration Day, January 20, 1981.
Six diplomats who evaded capture
- Robert Anders, 34 - Consular Officer
- Mark J. Lijek, 29 - Consular Officer
- Cora A. Lijek, 25 - Consular Assistant
- Henry L. Schatz, 31 - Agriculture Attaché
- Joseph D. Stafford, 29 - Consular Officer
- Kathleen F. Stafford, 28 - Consular Assistant
13 hostages released
From November 19-20, 1979, thirteen women and American personnel of African descent that had been captured and held hostage were released:
- Kathy Gross, 22 - Secretary
- Sgt. James Hughes, 30 - USAF Administrative Manager
- Lillian Johnson, 32 - Secretary
- Sgt. Ladell Maples, 23 - USMC Embassy Guard
- Elizabeth Montagne, 42 - Secretary
- Sgt. William Quarles, 23 - USMC Embassy Guard
- Lloyd Rollins, 40 - Administrative Officer
- Capt. Neal (Terry) Robinson, 30 - Administrative Officer
- Terri Tedford, 24 - Secretary
- Sgt. Joseph Vincent, 42 - USAF Administrative Manager
- Sgt. David Walker, 25 - USMC Embassy guard
- Joan Walsh, 33 - Secretary
- Cpl. Wesley Williams, 24 - USMC Embassy Guard
Richard I. Queen released
On July 11. 1980, 28-year-old Vice Consul Richard I. Queen, who had been captured and held hostage, was released after becoming seriously ill. He was later diagnosed with multiple sclerosis. (Died August 14, 2002.)
52 remaining hostages released
The following fifty-two remaining hostages were held captive until January 20, 1981.
- Thomas L. Ahern, Jr., - Narcotics Control Officer (later identified as CIA station chief)
- Clair Cortland Barnes, 35 - Communications Specialist
- William E. Belk, 44 - Communications and Records Officer
- Robert O. Blucker, 54 - Economics Officer Specializing in Oil (Died 4/3/2003)
- Donald J. Cooke, 26 - Vice Consul
- William J. Daugherty, 33 - 3rd Secretary of U.S. Mission
- Lt. Cmdr. Robert Englemann, 34 - U.S. Navy Attaché
- Sgt. William Gallegos, 22 - USMC Guard
- Bruce W. German, 44 - Budget Officer
- Duane L. Gillette, 24 - USN Communications and Intelligence Specialist
- Alan B. Golacinski, 30 - Regional Security Officer, Diplomatic Security Service
- John E. Graves, 53 - Public Affairs Officer (Died 4/27/2001)
- Joseph M. Hall, 32 - CWO Military Attaché
- Sgt. Kevin J. Hermening, 21 - USMC Guard
- Sgt. 1st Class Donald R. Hohman, 38 - U.S. Army Medic
- Col. Bob J. Holland, 53 - Military Attaché (Died 10/2/1990)
- Michael Howland, 34 - Assistant Regional Security Officer, Diplomatic Security Service, held at Iranian Foreign Ministry Office
- Charles A. Jones, Jr., 40 - Communications Specialist, Teletype Operator. (only African American hostage not released in November 1979)
- Malcolm Kalp, 42 - Commercial Officer (Died 4/7/2002)
- Moorhead C. Kennedy Jr., 50 - Economic and Commercial Officer
- William F. Keough, Jr., 50 - Superintendent of American School in Islamabad, Pakistan, visiting Tehran at time of embassy seizure (Died 11/27/1985)
- Cpl. Steven W. Kirtley - USMC Guard
- Capt. Eric M. Feldman, 24 - Military officer
- Kathryn L. Koob, 42 - Embassy Cultural Officer; one of two female hostages
- Frederick Lee Kupke, 34 - Communications Officer and Electronics Specialist
- L. Bruce Laingen, 58 - Chargé d'Affaires, held at Iranian Foreign Ministry Office
- Steven Lauterbach, 29 - Administrative Officer
- Gary E. Lee, 37 - Administrative Officer
- Sgt. Paul Edward Lewis, 23 - USMC Guard
- John W. Limbert, Jr., 37 - Political Officer
- Sgt. James M. Lopez, 22 - USMC Guard
- Sgt. John D. McKeel, Jr., 27 - USMC Guard (Died 11/1/1991)
- Michael J. Metrinko, 34 - Political Officer
- Jerry J. Miele, 42 - Communications Officer
- Staff Sgt. Michael E. Moeller, 31 - Head of USMC Guard Unit at Embassy
- Bert C. Moore, 45 - Counselor for Administration (Died 6/8/2000)
- Richard H. Morefield, 51 - U.S. Consul General in Tehran
- Capt. Paul M. Needham, Jr., 30 - USAF Logistics Staff Officer
- Robert C. Ode, 65 - Retired Foreign Service Officer on Temporary Duty in Tehran (Died 9/8/1995)
- Sgt. Gregory A. Persinger, 23 - USMC Guard
- Jerry Plotkin, 45 - civilian businessman visiting Tehran (Died 6/6/1996)
- MSgt. Regis Ragan, 38 - US Army NCO assigned to Defense Attaché's Office
- Lt. Col. David M. Roeder, 41 - Deputy USAF Attaché
- Barry M. Rosen, 36 - Press Attaché
- William B. Royer, Jr., 49 - Assistant Director of Iran-American Society
- Col. Thomas E. Schaefer, 50 - USAF Attaché
- Col. Charles W. Scott, 48 - US Army Officer, Military Attaché
- Cmdr. Donald A. Sharer, 40 - USN Air Attaché
- Sgt. Rodney V. (Rocky) Sickmann, 22 - USMC Guard
- Staff Sgt. Joseph Subic, Jr., 23 - Military Police, US Army, Defense Attaché's Staff
- Elizabeth Ann Swift, 40 - Chief of Embassy's Political Section; 1 of 2 female hostages (Died 5/7/2004)
- Victor L. Tomseth, 39 - Senior Political Officer, held at Iranian Foreign Ministry Office
- Phillip R. Ward, 40 - TDY Communications officer CIA, Assigned to Brandy Station, Va.
Servicemen awarded
For their service during the hostage crisis, the US military later awarded the 20 servicemen who were among the hostages the Defense Meritorious Service Medal. The only hostage serviceman not to be issued the medal was Staff Sgt. Joseph Subic, Jr. The reason given was that Subic did not behave under stress the way noncommissioned officers are expected to act, i.e. he cooperated with the hostage takers according to other hostages.
For their part in the mission, the Humanitarian Service Medal was awarded to the servicemen of Joint Task Force (JTF) 1-79 (the planning authority for Operation Rice Bowl/Eagle Claw) who participated in the rescue attempt.
Also, the USAF special ops component of the mission was awarded the AF Outstanding Unit award for that year for performing their part of the mission flawlessly, to include accomplishing the evacuation of the entire Desert One site after the accident and under extreme conditions.
Civilian hostages
A small number of hostages were not connected to the diplomatic staff. All had been released by late 1981.
Notable hostage takers, guards, interrogators
See also
Further reading
External links
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- hosts a gallery of photographs taken from inside the U.S. Embassy during the crisis.
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- , BBC's interview with Ebrahim Asgeh, a hostage-taker, and Bruce Laingen, a captive
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