Students storm the U.S. embassy in Tehran and seize hostages; they want the Shah sent home
On November 4, 1979, between 300 and 500 Iranian students overran the U.S. embassy in Tehran, angry that the Carter administration had granted asylum to the exiled Shah for cancer treatment. They blindfolded the Marines and embassy staff and paraded them in front of photographers. The students took approximately 90 hostages, 66 of them Americans at first, and demanded that the United States hand over Mohammad Reza Pahlavi. Ayatollah Khomeini, leader of the revolution that had deposed the Shah, backed them.
The seizure began a standoff that dominated the final year of Jimmy Carter's presidency and fed into his landslide loss in the 1980 election. The remaining hostages were released minutes after Ronald Reagan's inauguration. Sanctions on Iran, still a fixture of American foreign policy, trace back to this crisis.
QWhy were a woman and two African American hostages freed about two weeks after the takeover, and what did they have to do first?
On November 19, 1979, fifteen days after the takeover, the hostage-takers released one woman and two African Americans. The students used their captives to make a public point. Before the three were let go, they were required to praise the aims of the revolution at a press conference. The release was framed as proof of the revolution's character, and the condition attached to it turned their freedom into a public statement. The rest of the hostages remained inside the embassy. Later releases were rare, and Richard Queen, freed on July 11, 1980 because of illness, was among the few.
QHow did six Americans who slipped away from the embassy finally get out of Iran?
Six American diplomats evaded capture when the embassy fell, so they were never counted among the hostages. Their escape came on January 27, 1980, in an operation known as the Canadian Caper, less than three months after the takeover. The six left Iran using Canadian passports and a cover story that identified them as a film crew. The ruse worked on paperwork and a cover story. The episode stands apart from the rest of the crisis, which otherwise offered Washington few victories. The 52 Americans still held in Tehran stayed there for another year.
QWhat happened to the military rescue attempt, and who resigned over it?
Operation Eagle Claw, the American military attempt to free the hostages, took place on April 24, 1980, about five and a half months after the embassy was seized. It failed. The operation ended with the deaths of eight American soldiers and one Iranian civilian, and no hostages were reached. Secretary of State Cyrus Vance resigned after the failed operation. For the Carter administration, the failure closed off the most direct option it had tried, and the crisis continued through the rest of the election year, ending only after the Algiers Accords, the agreement that released the hostages, were signed.
