OPERATION EAGLE CLAW 1980, THE DISASTROUS BID TO END THE IRAN HOSTAGE CRISIS
OSPREY RAID 52
BY JUSTIN WILLIAMSON
ISBN 9781472837837
Present generations may think that there has always been enmity between the US and Iran, but it was not always so. Relations soured in 1979 after the US gave sanctuary to the exiled Shah. Fundamentalists took power and hostile crowds imprisoned hostages in the Tehran US embassy. A rescue mission was planned.
Delta, the new specialist anti-terror team in a daring debut mission was to lead other special operations and Rangers units, with support from the US Navy, Air Force, and CIA. The plan incorporated helicopters, transport aircraft, aerial tankers and gunships, carrier based fighters, carrier task forces, and clandestine ground transport trucks. It required night blackout operations on desert airstrips, seizing an Iranian airfield, multiple rendez-vous points, cargo, troop and hostage transfers, aerial and ground refuelling, and aerial protection, with the aim of releasing hostages from a vast embassy site.
Planning was meticulous - what could go wrong? After near collisions at take off, the aircraft ran into unforeseen dust storms disorientating the helicopters and forcing one down; a fuel truck set ablaze lighting up the desert night and a busload of unwanted civilian captives at the landing zone - then the catastrophe…
This was a complex high risk mission told clearly in a gripping stage by stage account, a serious incident in an eventful Cold War year, and a study of soldiers under stress in the adrenalin, hubris and confusion of combat. Diplomacy finally released the hostages in 1981. Recommended.
Thanks to Osprey for the sample www.ospreypublishing.com
TANKS OF THE BATTLE OF THE BULGE