I’m Mr. Beat Before we begin today’s story, let me tell
you about these things called embassies. Embassies are a permanent form of diplomatic
missions. Basically, it’s where a group of people from one country represent that country
within another country. They are there on behalf of their home country to carry out good relations
with the government of the country they are in. For example, let’s look at the United States.
These are all the countries where the United States has embassies abroad. Impressive,
dude. In fact, it has more embassies than all other single countries except for China.
Approximately 163 the last time I counted. And other countries have embassies
here in the United States. In fact, a shout out to Will from the channel Exploring
History, who works at the German embassy. (pause) Yeah he’s a German spy. I
gotta keep my eye out on him. Anyway, why am I bringing all this up? Well, on November 4, 1979, a bunch of
college students attacked and took over the United States embassy in Iran.
They then held 63 Americans hostage. Here’s the story of the Iran hostage crisis. Once upon a time, there was a country called Iran. In one video I called it I-RAN and
a lot of people made fun of me, so I’m just gonna say E RAHN in this video ok?
Anyway, t he year was 1953, and the Cold War was raging on. What’s the Cold War you say? (laughs)
Oh remember. My brother defined it once. Oh you want me to review what it was? Ok fine.
The Cold War was the state of political hostility that existed between the United States and their
allies and the Soviet Union and their allies from 1945 to 1991. And yes, in 1953, tensions were
especially high, and both the United States and the Soviet Union sought to influence Iran to THEIR
way of doing things, knowwhatImean? Well the prime minister of Iran, a dude named Mohammad Mosaddegh,
wanted to get rid of foreign corporate control over the country’s oil. The British, who made
lots of money from Iran’s oil, didn’t like this so much, so eventually they just decided to overthrow
Mosaddegh and put someone in power who WOULD let them make money from Iran’s oil. The British
got the United States government to help them do this. The Eisenhower administration, after all,
was worried Iran might fall to Communism under Mosaddegh’s leadership, especially being next
door to the Soviet Union and stuff. So together, they helped the locals stage a coup, overthrowing
Mosaddegh from power and replacing him with a king, or shah, named Mohammad Reza Pahlavi, on
August 19, 1953. The Shah, as folks referred to him, was anti-Communist and cool with letting
the British and other countries get lots of oil profits. However, he was VERY unpopular with most
Iranians. Sure, these coup supporters were happy, but they were the minority. Mossadegh, the prime
minister who they kicked out, was VERY popular, and democratically elected. Not only that,
but the shah ruled with an iron fist, getting rid of the country’s guarantees of personal
liberties that were there under Mosaddegh.The Shah regularly imprisoned and tortured his
opponents. So needless to say, this coup angered millions of Iranians, and they directed anger to
the British and Americans. I should say, it wasn’t all bad. For example, under the Shah’s leadership
Iran did see lots of economic growth, partially since the Shah helped redistribute wealth to the
country’s working class. The Shah also called for other reforms like allowing women to vote
and allowing non-Muslims to hold public office. In the years following the coup, the United States
continued to give LOTS of money to The Shah, and the Shah relied heavily on American support
just to stay in power. After this Iranians seemed to hate the United States more than any other
country. More and more Iranians protested. One of the leading protesters was a dude named
Ruhollah Khomeini. Even though he was a religious fundamentalist and a fanatic who openly called
for a theocracy and compared democracy to prostitution, Khomeini was also charismatic and
opened his arms to a diverse range of groups in order to oppose the Shah. His popularity only
grew after he was arrested and later exiled. Flash forward to December 31, 1977, and the now
American President Jimmy Carter showed up and gave a speech at a New Year’s Eve party hosted by the
Shah. In the speech, Carter claimed the Shah was “beloved” by his people and that all things
were groovy in Iran. Well they were not. Just months later, Iranians began mass demonstrations
in what became known as the Iranian Revolution. On January 16, 1979, now it was THE SHAH who
fled in exile. He fled to the United States, presumably to get treatment for his
ongoing cancer. But he never came back. The king was gone, and a new, Islamic government
put in his place, followed by the return of Ruhollah Khomeini. By the end of the
year Khomeini was Iran’s supreme leader. Oh hey, by the way, the Iranian
Revolution marked the end of an era in the entire Middle East. Hey, my friend
Tariq explains why this is.Tariq, are you there? I'm not sure where you're coming
in from, but...halo, Tariq? Thanks Matt. So the Iranian Revolution of 1979 serves as a book end of sorts in the history of
the modern Middle East. The period 1940 to 1979 saw the region dominated largely by two
ideologies, that sometimes competed, while sometimes otherwise completing each
other. Those being nationalism and socialism. The ascendency of the ayatollahs in Iran
introduced another contender to the wider region: Islamism. The Soviet invasion of
neighboring Afghanistan in late 1979, prompted the Afghan mujahideen to wage a jihad,
or holy war, thus further fueling the rise of this nascent political doctrine. A perennial grievance
of Islamists was and is to a large degree the involvement that the United States of America had
in the Middle East and in the Islamic World as a whole. This anger at America was mobilized
by the ayatollahs to great success. A key example of this being the Iranian hostage crisis,
which Matt is gonna go into much more detail on. Why yes I am. (turning to look the other way) Shakedown 1979, indeed. But these
cool kids DID have the time. So during this chaotic year in Iran, Jimmy Carter had attempted to keep diplomatic
relations going with the new Iranian government. But his decision to give the Shah asylum in
the United States was probably the last straw. On November 4, a militarized group of thousands
of Iranian college students loyal to Khomeini stormed the United States embassy in Tehran. The
embassy had little protection, and the mob was easily able to break in. They took 63 people there
hostage. Six American diplomats were somehow able to avoid being captured and escaped to the home of
the Canadian diplomat John Sheardown. The Canadian Prime Minister Joe Clark, later secretly issued
an order to allow Canadian passports to them so that they could escape. Working with the
United States Central Intelligence Agency, or CIA, they were able to rescue the six
Americans by producing a fake sci-fi film. No joke. Hollywood later dramatized the
whole thing in a REAL film called Argo. Later, Iranian students captured three more
hostages, bringing the total number to 66. The hostage-takers, or kidnappers I guess you could
call them, said they’d release the prisoners only if the Shah was returned to
Iran for trial and execution. I mean, why bother with a trial if you already
know you’re gonna execute him? Anyway, the hostage-takers also demanded that
the United States government apologize for its interference in the internal affairs
of Iran, including the overthrow of Mosaddegh. They also wanted Iran’s assets that were
locked up in the United States returned. Interestingly, even though the hostage-takers
were right-leaning Islamists, they received praise and even financial support from
left-leaning Marxists throughout the world. The hostage-takers did seem to have a soft spot
for the plight of oppressed minorities and women. One example of this is when they released one
female hostage and two African American hostages on November 19th. Before their release,
they made them hold a press conference where they praised the aims of the
Iranian Revolution. The next day, the hostage-takers released four additional
women and six additional African Americans. Meanwhile, back in the United
States, Americans, many of whom wouldn’t have been able to find
Iran on a map prior to this event, stayed glued to their televisions for updates
about the hostages. Beginning in January 1980, the CBS Evening News anchor Walter Cronkite
ended his nightly newscast by saying how many days had passed since the hostages were first
captured. The crisis united Americans and created a rise in patriotism. Sadly, it also caused a
rise in hate crimes against Iranian Americans. At first, President Carter tried diplomatic
pressure. When that didn’t work, he tried economic pressure. He ended oil imports from
Iran. He stopped weapons from being sold to Iran. Still, and this was a bit embarrassing to Carter, the hostage-takers and Khomeini, who had
approved of the whole thing, didn’t budge with negotiations. Negotiations
would be ongoing throughout 1980. Carter was growing impatient, and on April 24th,
he ordered Operation Eagle Claw, a rescue mission to free the hostages. However, nothing went right
on the mission. Helicopters malfunctioned. One got caught in a sand storm. Another ended
up crashing into a transport aircraft, causing eight servicemen to die. Carter aborted
the mission before more damage could be done. His administration later planned a second
rescue attempt, but it was never carried out. In response, by the summer of 1980, the
hostage-takers had moved the hostages to various prisons throughout Tehran
to prevent future rescue attempts. They did release another hostage
after he became seriously ill. While Iranian propaganda often reported that the
hostages were treated well, we later found out that this was definitely not the case. Many were
regularly beaten and tortured. Some experienced having their hands bound for weeks at a time. One
of the hostages was kept in solitary confinement for nine months. Another was held in a cell where
centipedes apparently crawled across his face when he tried to sleep at night. The hostage-takers
destroyed mail sent to the hostages, literally burning up Christmas packages sent. Most of it was
just threats and psychological torture. Conditions were so poor that two hostages attempted suicide.
Still, several hostages resisted. One hostage, an Army medic named Donald Hohman, went
on a hunger strike for several weeks. Another, Michael Metrinko, was beaten and
kept alone in a freezing cell for repeatedly talking trash about Khomeini. Four hostages
tried to escape. After they were caught, the hostage-takers put them
in solitary confinement. Meanwhile, 1980 was a presidential election
year, and the ongoing crisis certainly didn’t help Carter’s re-election chances. His biggest
opponent, Ronald Reagan, seized the moment, sharply criticizing how Carter had handled
everything. When Election Day did come, on November 4, exactly one year after
the hostages first were captured, Reagan won in a landslide, at least partially
due to how Carter had failed to free them. Even though he lost re-election, Carter had
kept negotiations going with the Iranian hostage-takers, right up until his last day in
office. On January 19, 1981, which WAS his last day in office, Carter and his administration
officially made a deal with Iranian leaders, in Algiers, Algeria, of all places. Known
as the Algiers Accords, the deal called for: The United States to stop intervening politically
and militarily in Iranian internal affairs The United States would let Iran have its
assets and lift its trade restrictions An international court would settle
future disputes between the two countries The United States wouldn’t conduct any shady
business when transferring the property which belonged to the now former Shah, who by the way
had died of cancer in Egypt the previous July. Iran had to pay off all debts
it had to American institutions And most importantly, Iran would set the
hostages free. After 444 days, they were free. As the hostages walked out to the plane that
would take them out of Iran, thousands of Iranians showed up to taunt them, shouting things like
“death to America.” When the pilot announced they had flown out of the country, according to the
author Mark Bowden "freed hostages went wild with happiness. Shouting, cheering, crying, clapping,
falling into one another's arms." Indeed, several of the hostages would suffer from PTSD for years
afterward because of the horrific experience. The next day, huge crowds
welcomed them home. It was over. The Iran hostage crisis was definitely a
setback for American morale and prestige in the world. On the flip side, the crisis kind
of strengthened the prestige of the Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini. That said, when Iraq invaded
Iran the next year in what became known as the Iran-Iraq War, much of the world didn’t come
to their rescue, and perhaps a big reason why was the hostage crisis. Even though Iran and the
United States reached a deal, relations between the two countries have stayed sour long afterward.
Even today, more than 40 years later, tensions are high. There is no United States embassy in Iran
and no Iranian embassy in the United States. In fact, the two countries haven’t had any
formal diplomatic relations since 1980. Seeing those hostages return home
will always have a big impact on me. It sucks that ordinary people are
often caught up in worldwide power struggles like this, but at least
this story had a happy ending. This video is sponsored in part by Ekster, the world’s largest small wallet brand.
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Thanks to Ekster for sponsoring this video! Don’t forget to check out my friend Tariq
’s video looking at the entire history of the modern Middle East from 1940 to 1979.
It’s over on his channel Hikma History. And if you recognize his channel, it’s
probably because we’ve collaborated several times over the past couple years.
Be sure to subscribe if you haven’t already. Remember earlier when my friend Tariq interrupted
this video to tell you about how the Iranian Revolution marks the end of an era in the middle
east well he just released a video at the same time as this one going into the entire history
of the modern middle east from 1940 to 1979 so check it out and if you recognize that channel
Hikma History it's because Tariq and i have collaborated several times over the past couple
years so if you're not subscribed to this channel yet please do so check out his video and
So what do you think? Thanks for watching!
