“As our team was withdrawing, after my order to do so, two of our American aircraft collided on the ground following a refueling operation in a remote desert location in Iran. Other information about this rescue mission will be made available to the American people when it is appropriate to do so.”
President Jimmy Carter explained the failed merits of “Operation Eagle Claw” to rescue the American hostages held by the Iranians on April 24, 1980. There was national dismay felt by many Americans that most likely cost Carter the presidency against Ronald Reagan. For months the Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khomeini refused to release the American hostages. Carter made a difficult decision approving a rescue plan that had little chance of success.
The rescue was expected to be carried out by helicopters with little knowledge of the terrain and how this type of aircraft would function in the desert. Whereas the military was motivated to free the hostages, there was no definitive information on their location in Tehran. Immediately there were problems after the helicopters and planes landed in Iran at “Desert One,” where they were surprised and forced to capture a full bus load of people who stumbled upon this site. Surprised again, an Iranian oil tanker emerged and, when it refused to stop, it was blown up with an anti-tank weapon. The blast lit up the sky, hurt the cover for American troops, and yet another Iranian vehicle stumbled onto this location and left.
Perhaps the largest challenges were seen by American helicopters, as two were forced to turn back because they had issues with their flight instruments. A third arrived at Desert One, but it faced hydraulic problems. The other helicopters made it to this position, but they battled sandstorms that delayed their arrival. Matters continued to deteriorate, as there were only five operational helicopters that lacked the ability to carry out this raid.
The commander aborted this assault, the helicopters refueled to reach the USS Nimitz, and the bus load of civilians was released. As the aircraft were about to depart, a helicopter’s blade hit an EC-130 that was carrying the fuel for this mission. Both blew up, killing five airmen and three Marines, and there were the charred remains of American aircraft in the Iranian desert.
Poor coordination, a lack of intelligence, mechanical failures, and almost no luck was present to guide this operation. A shaken Carter told Americans, “It was my decision to attempt the rescue operation. It was my decision to cancel it when problems developed in the placement of our rescue team for a future rescue operation. The responsibility is fully my own.” Reagan was infuriated over the lack of leadership that Carter presented over this botched mission that he called an “embarrassment” to this nation.
The hostage crisis finally ended on January 20, 1981, during the inauguration of new President Ronald Reagan. Speaking to the American people, Reagan did not mention Iran, but after 444 days, the fifty-two hostages boarded a plane to depart Tehran. The State Department created a newsreel of the events that occurred in the nation, and many of the hostages were surprised by the American hockey victory over the Soviet Union during the 1980 Lake Placid Olympic Games in New York.
Reagan was known for his foreign policy strengths against the Soviets and other foreign adversaries, but he faced hardships in the Middle East. In August 1982, the United States supported a peacekeeping operation in Lebanon. There were eight hundred American Marines, along with French and Italian military forces, who were deployed during the Lebanese Civil War between the warring factions of Christians and Muslims. For seven years, the fighting in Lebanon pushed the Israelis, Syrians, and the United Nations to intervene to help the instability of this nation. This once beautiful country was ravaged by fighting that is currently seen today through the recent Israeli military attacks against the Iranian-backed Hezbollah.
On September 10, the Marines pulled out of Beirut, only to arrive back on September 29 to prevent hostilities after Christians killed Palestinians. Reagan ordered the redeployment of the American military to help ensure the withdrawal of Palestinian Liberation Organization leader Yasser Arafat from Beirut and for the remaining Palestinians to be protected by these Western forces. The American military presence was widely targeted, and on April 18, 1983, a suicide bomber hit the American Embassy in Beirut and killed sixty-three people, including seventeen Americans. Eight members of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) who worked to provide necessary information to help protect the American ground forces were among the deaths.
The earliest foundations of Hezbollah claimed responsibility for this attack’s main goal of pushing the American Embassy out of Lebanon and hurting the 1,800 Marine Corps presence. Although these Americans were on a peacekeeping operation, this terrorist group that is still aided by Iran sought the large-scale death of our soldiers.
On October 23, 1983, a dump truck loaded with over twelve thousand pounds of explosives crashed through checkpoints and a security perimeter to kill American service members. This vehicle hit the Multinational Force (USMNF) that was stationed at Beirut International Airport. Some forty-three years ago, at 6 a.m., the explosives from this bomb destroyed a four-story Marine Battalion Landing Team headquarters that killed 241 and injured sixty Americans, who were mostly Marines. American security was consistently threatened well before this assault, and the ground commanders lacked credible intelligence to help protect their personnel.
The collection of suitable intelligence was a deadly problem for the Marines, as at one point there were over one hundred reports to warn the officers about terrorism against them. These Americans were in a vulnerable position as they were exposed and not fully protected against aggressors. At the same time that Americans were assaulted, another suicide bomber hit a building housing French paratroopers that killed fifty-eight of their soldiers. Reagan spoke to a saddened nation and stated, “For several years, Lebanon has been torn by internal strife. Once a prosperous, peaceful nation, its government had become ineffective in controlling the militias that warred on each other. Sixteen months ago, we were watching on our TV screens the shelling and bombing of Beirut, which was being used as a fortress by PLO bands. Hundreds and hundreds of civilians were being killed and wounded in the daily battles.”
Four months later, parts of this multinational force departed from Lebanon, and the last Marines left Beirut on February 26, 1984. The Iranians used their earliest “proxies” to exert control over the Middle East and to pressure the withdrawal of Western forces.
Twenty years after the Beirut bombing, Americans still sought justice against this terrorism that was directed by the Iranian government. On May 30, 2023, a federal judge stated that Iranian-backed Hezbollah willingly carried out this attack against the American military and government figures. This ruling allowed families of these lost Americans to sue the Iranian government for their role in supporting this deadly terrorism. Four years later, a U.S. District Judge ruled that Iran was responsible to pay $2.65 billion to these families. After additional lawsuits, in 2013, another American judge approved the release of $1.75 billion from a seized New York Citibank account to compensate the survivors of these Iranian-backed attacks.
Next week’s story will address the continued acts of terrorism and hostage taking against Americans in the Middle East.