National Security Adviser Zbigniew Brzezinski advocated a series of steps that would gradually tighten a noose around Iran, only to encounter resistance from within the administration at every turn. He proposed an immediate naval blockade on Iran, shutting down all of its imports and exports, a move that would have had the added benefit of pressuring European allies who relied on Iranian oil. It was opposed by the State Department, which felt it would do more to harm American alliances than to end the crisis. The president did act. Over the concerns of the Justice Department, Carter ordered most Iranian diplomats to leave, began deportation proceedings against all Iranians in the United States illegally, and banned oil purchases from Iran. He also froze the billions in Iranian assets in American banks.
Rescuing the hostages, furnishing the episode with a Hollywood ending, appeared to be nothing more than a fantasy. The isolation of Tehran, the location of the embassy compound in the heart of a city on fire with anti- Americanism, the easy opportunity for retaliation against the hundreds of American citizens living there—reporters, expatriates, spouses of Iranians, businessmen—all made it a very unattractive option. At the highest levels of government, Secretary of State Vance and his deputy Warren Christopher were dead set against any military effort to rescue their colleagues, and at that point in mid-November even the men secretly planning hard to create that option regarded it as foolhardy. Colonel Beckwith himself set the probability of success at “zero.”
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Inside the White House, there were two schools of thought about how to deal with the crisis. They were represented by Vance and Brzezinski, who were increasingly at odds. Vance was a patrician lawyer and a gentleman who placed a great deal more faith than the national security adviser in the rationality and decency of his fellow man. His formative experience in public life had been the Vietnam War, which he had originally endorsed as President John F. Kennedy’s secretary of the army, but which he turned against late in his tenure as President Lyndon B. Johnson’s deputy defense secretary. He had been a member of the American delegation to the Paris peace talks in 1968. Experience had made him a strong believer in negotiation, and that, along with his direct responsibility for the State Department employees held in Tehran, led him to place paramount importance on their safe return. Brzezinski thought more in terms of vital national interests and the importance of America’s world stature. If the United States and its diplomats could be attacked and hog-tied with impunity by a rabble of Iranian amateurs, then could American officials be considered safe anywhere in the world? For his part, the secretary of state cited the restraint with which President Harry Truman had handled a hostage-taking incident in 1949, when Chinese officials arrested Angus Ward, the U.S. consul general; Ward was eventually released and deported. Vance was meeting regularly with the families of the hostages and had taken Carter to one of the sessions five days after the takeover.
The first big session was held at the State Department in late November. The families, who traveled at government expense, were escorted into the building through the grand marble lobby beneath its colorful forest of flags. For those with little experience in official Washington—spouses of the marines and lower-level embassy staff personnel—it was exciting and intimidating, and they were grateful that the country’s most important officials were taking the time to brief and reassure them. But to the more experienced family members of foreign service officers, the hidden agenda of the meetings was clear. Barbara Rosen, a tough-minded Italian Catholic woman who taught school in the Bronx, had known from the first solicitous calls from Washington after the takeover that the unspoken message was not to break ranks and criticize the president or the administration.
That was not the sentiment for most in the room. All of the family members were under siege by local and national press; whatever they said was printed and broadcast across the country. Rita Ode and her captive husband Bob were retirees; he had taken the Tehran assignment as a temporary fill-in position, with the promise that he would be home for Christmas. They were building a retirement home in Arizona. When would he be home now? Dorothea Morefield, whose husband Richard was the embassy consul, believed strongly that the embassy should have been evacuated and closed before allowing the shah to enter the United States. Now she was at home in San Diego with four children, wondering if they would ever see their father again. Barbara Rosen considered Carter’s response to the takeover to be flabby and indecisive; she felt strongly that the United States should have immediately cut off all ties with Iran, and refused to deal with them until her husband Barry and the others had been returned. But these were not the sentiments the department wanted aired. Except for the parents of the young marines, the wives and families of the military and CIA hostages seemed to be more at peace with the predicament; an element of risk was assumed in their work. Many of them were ready to accept the need for the United States to act militarily, and some were disappointed that Carter had not done so already. But many of the spouses and families of the foreign service officers, and those of the two stray civilians trapped at the embassy, California businessman Jerry Plotkin and school headmaster Bill Keough, were indignant. They and their husbands had not signed on for something like this. Why had Carter not closed the embassy and evacuated American personnel before permitting the shah to come to the United States? This response should have been foreseen.
Penne Laingen, the charge’s wife, was asked to write a letter welcoming everyone. It had been copied and placed on all the chairs in the auditorium. Mindful of the anger felt by many, she urged that such feelings be set aside. Dwelling on the administration’s mistakes was unhelpful, she explained. What was needed was to rally behind the president. As she took her seat, she noticed that the young women next to her, daughters of Bill Keough, had drawn dark lines through much of what she had written. One of them stood, held up the letter, and made a show of tearing it into small pieces. Laingen would later hear herself denounced by some family members as “a State Department stooge.”
Despite an official desire to keep the session private, some of the family members carried tape recorders and would deliver recordings of the session to reporters waiting outside. Journalist Robert Shaplen of
Vance opened the session, promising the families that the government was doing everything in its power to bring their loved ones home safely. He urged them all to keep writing letters to the captives, although it was doubtful any would be delivered. More reassurance came from Under Secretary of State David Dunlop Newsom, who pledged to hold meetings of the families whenever they felt the need.
“I want to know if they’re being brainwashed. Are their feelings being deformed?” asked one wife.
More challenging questions followed. Even Vance’s request for them to write letters was challenged.
“I don’t want them to get hold of my handwriting,” said one woman. Captain Neil Robinson, one of the hostages just released, was present at the meeting, and he said he had been reluctant to write his wife from Tehran because he didn’t want the Iranians to know where she lived.
A heated discussion sprang up over the point Penne Laingen had wanted to avoid, namely, Why had the shah been allowed into the country when it was known that doing so would place the embassy at risk?
Newsom talked about the assurances they had received from the provisional government, and about America’s long “friendship” with the shah. “It was a difficult decision to make,” he said. Those in the crowd were not in a forgiving mood. Many had received reassurances about the assignment that had proved hollow, and their loved ones were paying the price. Why hadn’t they at least warned the embassy staffers beforehand, given them a chance to come home before the storm hit?
Penne Laingen spoke up.
“It was poor judgment, a monumental mistake, but we have done nothing wrong morally or legally,” she said.
“I felt betrayed by the United States government,” said Captain Robinson. “What happened should have been anticipated. Attacking Carter, though, will just make it more difficult now.”
Penne Laingen told the crowd that she had been fortunate enough to speak regularly with her husband on the phone at the Foreign Ministry in Tehran and that he had urged everyone to be patient and to support the efforts of the State Department. A recent cable from the charge was read aloud.
We cannot and do not presume to know these men and women as well as you who are members of their
