Guests Of The Ayatollah: The Iran Hostage Crisis Read Online Free

them—if they were going to maintain control of the action they needed to prevent rival political organizations from storming inside. Mohammad Naimipoor had his large group of protesters assigned with forming a giant human ring around the chancery. Some of the chador-wearing women carried bolt cutters under their robes, for the chains on the gates, and also new chains and locks with which to secure the gates behind them. In addition to the laminated photos and armbands, all carried cards identifying their organization. Some carried the strips of cloth to bind and blindfold their American captives. It was both thrilling and daunting. Many saw the fine Aban rain that morning as heavenly approval, a symbol of Iran purifying itself, washing itself clean of its relationship with the Great Satan.
    Hashemi’s concealed weapon was more to deal with rival factions than with the Americans. A short-lived takeover of the embassy in February had devolved into gunfights between competing militias. The students had decided that their assault would be strictly nonviolent. They would not harm the Americans, even if they opened fire. But there was also a chance things would get out of control. Would the marines shoot? If they did, and the bloodied bodies of martyrs were passed out to the crowd, what would happen then?

The Morning Meeting
    Walking down the wide corridor that ran the length of the chancery’s second floor, John Limbert mapped out his day in hopes of finding an hour to slip out for a haircut. He was on his way to the meeting that officially began each workday at the embassy. The second secretary in the political section, he had been traveling the week before in southern Iran, and it occurred to him that his thick brown hair, which now fell over the tops of his ears, must look pretty shaggy.
    Ordinarily Limbert did not attend the morning meeting, which was chaired by the acting ambassador, Bruce Laingen, the chargé d’affaires, and included the various embassy departmental heads. Today he had been invited to sit in for his boss, First Political Secretary Ann Swift, who was coming in late. Everyone was eager to hear about his swing through the cities of Abadan and Shiraz. Limbert was an ambitious foreign service officer, but about him there was nothing pushy or abrasive. He was a loose-limbed, affable man with a narrow face and a nose so ample, starkly framed by dark-rimmed glasses above and by a heavy brown mustache below, that it ruled his face. Behind stylish, lightly tinted lenses were the playful eyes of an intensely curious and fun-loving soul. The loose cut of his suit advertised that he had lived primarily outside of the United States in recent years. This assignment to Iran had been ideal for him, one for which he was particularly well suited. He had spent years in the country, first in the Peace Corps and later as a teacher working on his doctorate in Middle Eastern studies, and he spoke Farsi so well that when he wore locally made clothes he passed for Iranian. That wasn’t necessarily a good thing in an American embassy, where there was an institutional suspicion of foreign service officers who had “gone native,” but Iran was suddenly of utmost importance in Washington, and Limbert’s set of skills and experience was rare. He had been at this job for only a few months and was still conscious of making the right impression. He wished he’d gotten the haircut earlier.
    Limbert was one of two political officers who worked with Swift. The other was Michael Metrinko, whom Limbert had known before this assignment. Metrinko had partly learned his Farsi from Limbert’s Iranian wife, Parvaneh, who had taught him when he was a Peace Corps volunteer; she considered him to have been her best student. Along with the head of that section, Victor Tomseth, who was also acting deputy chief of mission, these three were among a very small number of fluent Farsi-speaking Iran experts in the State Department. With their years