Remembering The Iran Hostage Crisis: 444 Days In The Dark

gq.com:

They were geeks with guns - hundreds of Muslim medical and engineering students who stormed the U.S. embassy in the heart of Tehran on November 4, 1979. In brazen violation of international law, they triumphantly seized as hostages sixty-six Americans. The Americans were CIA, they claimed, and the embassy a "nest of spies."

Read the whole story: gq.com

Comments

[Justtellthetruth]

Say, you know what preceded the Hostage Crisis? The CIA assassinated Iran's secular, democratically elected president, and replace him with the Shah, a dictator so brutal that he pretty much single handedly inspired the Islamic Revolution in Iran. He tortured and killed thousands. Ruled with an Iron fist.

Know what came AFTER the revolution and the subsequent hostage crisis?

We armed (with conventional and WMD)and green lighted Saddam Hussein to start a war against Iran that caused a MILLION casualties on both sides. ONE MILLION. Now, I feel terribly for the hostages, but try to imagine such a HUGE percentage of the population of the US dying in a war started by and funded by another country.

regardless of this Iran has STILL not started a war with another nation in about 250 years.

The answer lies in changing US middle eastern policy and QUITTING oil. NOT in further demonizing Iran. We staged a coup in their country with hellish results and caused more than half a million casualties there. Hostages? It seems like nothing in comparison.

[stanschurman]

You're mostly correct. The Iranian Prime Minister, Mossedeq, was not assassinated, but he was deposed thanks to a CIA led plot to discredit him. His sin was to nationalize the Iranian oil industry after decades of Iran being scr*wed by Britain and the US. And, yes, he was replaced by the US puppet dictator, the Shah. At least part of the reason for the seizure of the embassy was because the students, among others, thought that the US was plotting to re-install the Shah after he was given sanctuary by Jimmy Carter in the US.

It might also be worthwhile to mention how Ronnie "Gosh Golly Gee" Ray Gun arranged for the hostages to be held an additional 79 days so they could be released after he took office. Nice guy.

[MaxPowerXP]

Say, you know what happens everytime someone says something vaguely negative about Iran, no matter how justified? Some kid thinks he's clever in pointing this out.

[Khirad]

Pt. I

Just some (and certainly not all) select quotes I found revealing and of interest, with me in brackets:

Gallegos: They tied us up, blindfolded us, dragged us outside. I remember shaking, and I was like, Why am I shaking? And then I realized it wasn't me; it was the two guys holding me. [these were kids who got in over their heads]

Joseph Hall: They accused the United States of causing some crop failures in Iran. I told them, tongue in cheek, that yes indeed, I was the agent for wheat mold. They worked on that one for about a day and a half. [for more on this, I suggest Nikki R. Keddie's book(s) on the Revolution]

Rosen: They'd beat the freakin' hell out of you, and then they'd ask, "When this is all over, can I get a visa?" In Iranian culture, they can compartmentalize anything. [I'm sorry but that was almost humorous, because there is so recurrent truth to that]

Aaron: Khomeini began to see how he could use this to clean out the café liberals who were running the government. [and any and all revolutionaries and erstwhile comrades who crossed his path did indeed receive the wrath of the Black Turbaned Shah]

Hodding Carter: The Shah himself had been our chief source of information about internal dissent! [And accused Khomeini of being a British agent, etc... any of this sounding familiar?]

[Khirad]

Cont. Pt. II

Farhang: I thought of him as the Mahatma Gandhi of Iran. I didn't know he was going to be the Reverend Jones. [Yup, the smart began to wise up quickly though]

Bazargan: I realized later that he didn't really want to resolve the situation. He also didn't want me to solve the crisis, because my popularity in Iran would have risen, which would have been a direct threat to him. [hmm, just like the shah before him!]

--

In this, on the Iranian domestic front, you see a popular uprising against the shah consolidated and hijacked by extremists intent on purging their former kin for power and an uncompromising, stern ideology which the Iranian people had not signed on to. Some ask what would have happened in 1980 had Carter granted asylum, succeeded in Operation Eagle Claw (or not been outflanked by Reagan's presage to the Iran-Contra affair). I ask, what would the Islamic Republic have become had people like Bazargan, Banisadr, and Taleghani (has he lived) not been puritanically driven out by a charismatic firebrand and his thugs, best represented by Ayatollah Khalkhali in the article, or had Montazeri not been dropped in favor of Khamene'i for succession as Velayat-e Faghih, etc? Most people frown on alternative history as being an empty endeavor, please forgive me for indulging in 'what ifs'. And, clearly those former hostage takers and prominent reformists now in jail are part of the Soros' conspiracy! [sarcasm]

[seattle music]

My proud, beautiful, anti-Shah, anti-Khomeini friend was arrested at the airport in Tehran by the Iranian Islamist hardliners and no one has seen him or heard from him since that day over thirty years ago.

The situation in Iran after the Shah was over-thrown was MUCH more complex than most hard-liner Islamists will admit.

There are MILLIONS who opposed BOTH the Shah and the Islamist extremists. Tens of thousands of them were murdered for it. Tens of thousands more are in permanent exile. We saw protests by tens of thousands of them this summer. More were imprisoned, raped, murdered, beaten.

One can be BOTH anti-Shah and anti-Isalmist extremist. Most Iranians fall into that middle ground.

[Khirad]

EXACTLY!!!

[Albert Amato]

Correct...­.. and that is true of most educated people in most countries.­.....not true in many that indoctrinate their young with hatred and contempt for other people for political and tactical reasons.

[Hass]

The United States recently attacked an Iranian consulate in Iraq and imprisoned 5 Iranian diplomats there for 2 years, over the vociferous complaints of the government of Iraq. I guess the "sanctity" of diplomatic property is, like everything else, a case of "good for me, but not for you".

Read more at: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/11/03/remembering-the-iran-host_n_343898.html

[Khirad]

Nope, some of us try to be consistent. How were they treated, by the way?

[hanoum]

John Belushi of SNL did a great skit on this at the time. He was supposed to be an "intelligence officer" in the Tehran American Embasy. As he tries to make time with a worried secretary, shouts of "Magdar Shah" (death to the Shah) can be heard from the window. When the secretary asks him what the crowd is chanting, Belushi answers , Oh, they love the Shah and America.

An interesting introduction to Foreign Policy.

[PartyPartyParty]

444 days in the dark? U.S. citizens have been in the dark about Iran since 1953, when a CIA-backed coup toppled an elected government and put the Shah in power. And most U.S. citizens choose to continue to stay in the dark, including willfully ignoring the fact that the GOP illegally interfered with U.S. negotiations to release the hostages -- AFTER the presidential election.

[mick7191]

No one mentions 1953. Ever. Almost like it didn't happen.

[PartyPartyParty]

And when I do mention it, most of the responses I get are along the lines of: "What? That's ancient history. Has nothing to do with today."

Such is the brain trust of the majority of my fellow U.S. voters.

[MajorKong]

Didn't you know that Iranian history began in 1979?

[babak2500]

Ok, you guys want to talk about history then lets talk. Oh, yes the 1953 COUP where the democratic elected govermnet that was toppled. You talk about thid coup with so much passion as if Mossadeg himself believed in democracy. He got elected our came to power with the help of the tudeh party which was sponsered by the soviets. Tudeh believed that Mosadegh was an old weak man and that it would have been easy to remove him from power. THE SAME MISTAKE WHAT THEY DID WITH KHOMENI !!! Do you actually know enough about Mosadegh Past ? Do you know that he was a family member of the old Qajar-clan? The same Qajar who almost destroyed Iran. You don't know anything about irans History. Or do you think by talking trash about the Shah or being Anti-Shah, you would sound more intelectual? Why don't you mention that in 1944 the allies invaded Iran which was neutral in WW II and used iran as a victory bridge vor suppling arms to the Russians? Please stop repeating the cold- war Propaganda Slogans. Tha Shah was not the friend of the americans and he proved by raising the Oil prizes. This ofcourse bodered the US and eventually you did what was in your interest = Khomeni. Instead of critisizing the shah, you start with Jimmy Carter. You should thank him for his Green Belt Policiy which strengthend islamic Terrorism.

[Khirad]

"Do you know that he was a family member of the old Qajar-clan? The same Qajar who almost destroyed Iran."

Wow, and that has what to do with him? Sins of the father? You also really oversimplified the relationship with Tudeh, etc. You are guilty of the same accusations you dole out.

[PartyPartyParty]

And you talk about Iran as if you were Winston Churchill. Who was the one pressing for U.S. help with the 1953 coup. Gotta keep those oil fields out of Persian control, don't you know.

[quisp65]

GOP illegally interfered? Is that heresay? Keep in mind the cause of this was Eisenhower a Democrat.

[BiBiJan]

To fully appreciate the extent of ignominy of taking over the American embassy and holding the staff for 444 days, that indelible shame that early revolutionary zeal bestowed to Iran, it is instructive to consider the historical record.

In the Public orations of Demosthenes (384-322 BCE), there are references to Aphobetus, ambassador to the King of Persia. Considering the relative size and power of the Persian empire vs that of Greece, it is fair to assume that it was an Iranian invention to respect the sanctity of an embassy and the diplomatic immunity of an ambassador.

There could not have been a more savage act, an un-Iranian act, than defiling a concept invented by Iranians themselves.

While 27 years of the reign of the US 'friend', the Shah, one of the most brutal dictatorships in modern times may be used by some to justify idiotic acts of excess, 30 years hence is high time for Iranians to hang their heads low and apologize.

http://www.bibijon.org/iranimage/

[Khirad]

Wow, we agree, though I understand the motivations and justified anxiety - it just got way out of hand. Yes, 'bast' is very old.

[research]

Look up October Surprise.

Raygun treasonously interfered with Carters negotiations to release the hostages.

Raygun trade those hostages for missiles. Yes, Raygun traded missile to Iran twice, months after his inauguration, and later for the Contras.

[PWM]

Reagan was a horrible president and a worse human being.

[amdezurik]

worked for Nixon at the Paris peace talks, kept Nam going for 6 more years

[delvis]

with drug money, reagan needs the shoe

[Khirad]

And yet Obama was excoriated for his Berlin speech being "presumptuous".

[quisp65]

If you look on wikipedia this is listed as a conspiracy theory. I guess you are a birther democrat equivalent.

[research]

Read it, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/October_surprise_conspiracy_theory

I don't believe in political coincidences.

Means and motive.