Guests of the Ayatollah

“What’s the matter with him?” Quarles asked.

“The shah killed his family,” a guard said. “He’s very upset with Americans.”

It seemed to Quarles that every Iranian he met had lost someone to the shah. The image of the berserk baggage handler stayed with him a long time.

Quarles, Maples, and Gross were the first of thirteen black and female hostages Khomeini had ordered released as a gesture to oppressed African-Americans and as a demonstration of the “special status” accorded women under Islamic rule. The students had high hopes for this gesture. They had long believed that black Americans would identify with their struggle and take to the streets all over the United States in support; they felt sure this release would help spur such demonstrations. Ironically, among the blacks released was Air Force Captain Neil Robinson, one of the most important intelligence officers at the embassy. There was racism in the Iranian assumption that blacks and women would have held only menial jobs. Charles Jones, the only African- American hostage who was not released, had forfeited his status as an unimportant black man by having been caught inside the communications vault on the day of the takeover. There were only two women left behind: Ann Swift, who had announced her own importance, and Kathryn Koob, whose directorship of the Iran-America Society had marked her for certain as a spy.

Joan Walsh, the political section secretary, was among the ten released the next day. She was allowed to shower for the first time in two weeks and was given a clean pullover shirt and slacks. She and the others were seated in a row beneath a large, hand-lettered sign condemning the United States for sheltering the shah. It read, “America is supporting this nasty criminal under the pretext of sickness.” The hostages sat before a long, low row of tables set with microphones. Orchestrating was the wiry, bushy-haired Hussein Sheikh-ol-eslam, who instructed the gathered members of the press that while they were not allowed to ask any questions of an individual hostage; they could ask general questions. The microphone would be passed down the line, he said, and each question would be answered by the hostages in turn.

“And I will tell you the name of the hostage as the microphone gets passed along,” he said.

“Can they also tell us their name and hometown?” one of the reporters shouted. Walsh flushed with pleasure to hear an American voice. She felt more comfortable.

Walsh was led back with the other women to one of the cottages after the press conference, and the Iranian women there were suddenly bubbling with excitement and friendly, as though they were supervising a sleepover. Walsh did her best to stare right through them. She wasn’t inclined to forgive and forget.

They were put in vans and driven through the hostile mob at the gates. Cameras recorded them smiling and waving as they drove away from the embassy and to freedom.

* * *

The release of the thirteen black and female hostages was accompanied by a kind of media blitz within Iran. The same day that Quarles, Maples, and Gross were flown out, the imam himself granted interviews to all three major American TV networks. Robert MacNeil, of the PBS news program The MacNeil/Lehrer Report, flew to Tehran but returned home when he was informed that the three commercial networks would get to interview Khomeini first.

Mike Wallace of the CBS show 60 Minutes got to go first and spent an hour questioning Iran’s supreme leader. Sixty-five million American viewers saw the grim, white-bearded ayatollah easily parry the reporter’s extremely respectful questions—“He [Anwar Sadat] called you, forgive me, imam—his words, not mine—a ‘lunatic.’” The imam didn’t flinch. The hostages would be released when the shah was returned. The hostages were spies. They had been caught red-handed.

“As long as Mr. Carter does not respect international laws, these spies cannot be returned,” he said. Khomeini said that releasing the hostages after the shah’s return would be a kind gesture on his part, not a quid pro quo. “In reality, these spies should be tried.”

“Is Iran at war with the United States?” Wallace asked.

“What do you mean by war?” Khomeini answered. “If you mean our armies going against the United States armies, no. There is no such war. If you mean, it is a battle of nerves, it is Carter’s doing. We are against war. We are Muslims. We desire peace for all.”

Taking a stab at unofficial diplomacy, Wallace tried to extend the interview with a question that had not been submitted in advance.

“As one human being to another,” he asked. “Is there no room for compromise?”

The interpreter balked, but the correspondent prevailed on him to put the question to the imam. Khomeini refused to answer it.

The interview was watched at the White House with great interest. No matter how fruitless, the TV network had gotten a lot further in establishing a dialogue with Iran than had the administration. Jody Powell found Wallace’s deference to the ayatollah appalling. The press had become openly contemptuous in Washington; reporters were beating up the Carter administration daily and pitilessly for its handling of the crisis, yet the chief kidnapper was questioned with what sounded like obeisance: “Forgive me, Oh Imam, his words not mine” became a frustrated laugh line in the White House.

The release of the thirteen was accompanied by a chilling threat. Khomeini announced that the remaining Americans were going to be placed on trial “soon” as spies. It was precisely the scenario Carter most feared. He publicly ordered the aircraft carrier Kitty Hawk to sail from waters near the Philippines to the Indian Ocean, off the coast of Iran. At a press conference in the East Room of the White House, an especially dour president said Iran had created an “unprecedented” situation. “For a government to applaud mob violence and terrorism,…to participate in the taking of hostages, ridicules the common ethical and religious heritage of humanity,” he said, and added that the United States would employ “every means available” to deal with it.

ABC reporter Sam Donaldson asked the president whether the United States would be willing to let such an outrage continue “indefinitely.”

“It would not be advisable for me to set a deadline,” said Carter, who added, “any excessive threat…might cause the deaths of the hostages, which we are determined to avoid.”

3. Only Whores Go Without Underwear

As winter settled over Tehran, a season of short days, rain, and occasional snow, the trappings of imprisonment began to feel more permanent. The students who had planned the takeover of the embassy receded from daily view, replaced by a rougher breed of guards, many from the ranks of Revolutionary Guards, who hadn’t been students since attending the shah’s secondary schools. Most of the male hostages were moved to a large rectangular room in the basement of the warehouse. It had once been used to house electronic equipment that analyzed data from the Tacksman sites but had been emptied months before. There was a row of pillars in the middle of the space, and because it was windowless and damp, perfect conditions for growing fungi, it was christened the Mushroom Inn. Its white acoustical ceiling tile was high, almost fifteen feet up, and the space was starkly lit day and night by recessed fluorescent bulbs. Diesel engines were used to generate power for electricity and the sickly sweet fumes hung perpetually in the air. Hostages were assigned places on the floor, and each had a thin foam mattress. In time the guards used empty bookshelves to divide the space into separate cubicles so that, unless he stood, a prisoner could see only the man directly opposite him.

There was some comfort in being surrounded by the others. Golacinski had Vice Consul Don Cooke to one side and marine Greg Persinger to the other. Directly across from him was the assistant defense attache, Lieutenant Colonel Dave Roeder. In a side room the guards rolled in a TV set and played some tapes of American shows, escorting small groups of hostages in on an irregular schedule. Golacinski’s group watched an episode of The Carol Burnett Show, and then an old baseball game. When the “Star-Spangled Banner” was played before the game he felt a powerful pride welling up and noticed that the others in the room were smiling and winking at each other. Because Golacinski was familiar to so many of his captors due to his role on the first day, he was one of the few to whom they would speak. One, a medical student, told him that President Carter was sending Ramsey Clark, the former attorney general, as an emissary to Tehran to negotiate for their release. Golacinski asked if he could tell the others. He was taken to a corner of the room and told that he could say that Clark was coming, but nothing else.