The view from the Idea Center

Do you remember the images of 40 years ago today?

American flags on fire or being stomped on the ground. American citizens being lead blindfolded into captivity. And revolutionary Iranian students, angry at the United States, protesting and rioting, without knowing what their actions would spiral into.
 
So began 444 days of knowing that 52 Americans, including three Ohioans, were being held against their will.
 
That's where we were in 1979, as America's willingness to accept the deposed Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi for medical treatment became the tipping point of a revolt. Iranians thought that after helping to heal him, America would then seek to reinstate him to power.
 
We watched closely from Ohio as three of our men were being held inside the Embassy:

• Joseph M. Hall of Elyria was a military attaché.
• Steven Lauterbach was from North Dayton and served as an administrative officer.
• Bert C. Moore hailed from Mount Vernon and was the counselor for administration for the embassy.

The hostage situation led to American blood spilled, the resignation of U.S. Secretary of State Cyrus Vance and the eventual change of power, as incumbent President Jimmy Carter lost his re-election bid.
 
The former embassy in Tehran is now an Islamic cultural center and a museum, preserved from the days when it was a prison in 1979 and standing as a symbol of the Iranian revolution.
 
Not quite the Day of Infamy that was Pearl Harbor nor the still-unbelievable terror of the World Trade Center attack, but an occasion to be remembered.
 
40 years.

I’ll talk you to you tomorrow morning,
Rick Jackson

Need to KnOH

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Your ideas

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