RUTHFULLY YOURS

The hostage crisis between 1979 and 1981 needs to be remembered as a signal of the kind of regime with which we are again negotiating.

Is Iran a country we can trust in any kind of agreement — nuclear or otherwise? A realistic answer could be found in an event that took place before most people in both countries were born.

America and Iran broke off diplomatic relations in 1979. That’s some two generations ago. With talks between the two countries underway, it would be a good time to revisit exactly what initiated that break. There is another, seemingly irrelevant question, that arises at the same time: Just how important is diplomatic immunity? It’s a question at the heart of the distrust.

Up until 1979, Iran was one of America’s staunchest Middle East allies. Between 1941 and 1979, it was ruled by Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi, an autocratic, pro-Western monarch whose reign was supported by the United States.

Like any ruler of a non-democratic Middle East country, Pahlavi was no shrinking violet. His Savak secret police were brutal against any faction that opposed his authority, especially Islamic fundamentalists.

At the same time, the Shah modernized his country with a series of reforms. He instituted land reform and wealth sharing. The incomes of middle-class Iranians increased substantially. Women were not forced to wear headscarves, they dressed in the latest Western styles, they attended universities, and held professional positions.

By 1979, though, the Shah, sick with cancer, lost control of Iran, following huge street protests incited by Islamic fundamentalists. The Shah went into exile, and one month later, on February 1, Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, returned to Tehran from exile at Paris, establishing the Islamic Republic of Iran.

The United States maintained a fully staffed embassy throughout the turmoil, but just nine months after Khomeini’s return, the American embassy was overrun, and all 52 inside were held hostage. This was one of the clearest violations of diplomatic immunity in history.

The American hostages were humiliated in staged photo shoots and mistreated.  In response, President Carter ordered all Iranians in their embassy at Washington to return home, and the United States formally ended relations with the Islamic regime. The Americans were held for 444 days and were released only as President Reagan was inaugurated.

To understand the gravity of throwing aside the international equilibrium of diplomatic immunity, it might be useful to consider what happened to our embassies at Tokyo and Berlin after Pearl Harbor. By the end of 1941, relations between America and Germany and Japan had deteriorated to the point that Washington recalled its ambassador to protest Germany’s invasions in Western Europe and the Soviet Union and its terror bombing of London.

The diplomat in charge of our embassy, George Kennan, held the rank of chargé d’affaires, considered a secondary position to ambassador. Similarly, our embassy at Tokyo was down to a skeleton staff. There were also a few American nationals, mostly journalists, in both countries.

After the formal declarations of war were passed in December 1941, America gathered all Japanese and Germans in their embassies. The Germans were sent to the posh Greenbrier Hotel at White Sulfur Springs, West Virginia; the Japanese to the equally luxurious Homestead Hotel, also in West Virginia. They were placed under guard but lived rather well.

It was remembered afterwards that the Germans did not hold back taking full advantage of the hotel’s bar and restaurant, living in high style, probably realizing their lives would be more stark once they returned to their homeland. The Americans in Germany were also sent to a resort hotel near Berlin. Unfortunately, it was a summer resort with almost no heat, and their stay began in December. The Americans at Tokyo remained in the embassy under guard but were never threatened.

By the following summer, the Swiss negotiated an exchange. All embassy staff and foreign nationals were returned to their respective countries. In other words, in the middle of the bloodiest war in  history, even Adolf Hitler respected diplomatic immunity.

In contrast, just nine months after the Ayatollah returned to Tehran, Iran made a mockery of international law, one of the oldest and most widespread practices between nations. It dates as far back as the Seventh Century before the common era. Even Genghis Khan and the Mongols insisted on the rights of foreign officials and were brutal to those who didn’t adhere to this rule.

The Iranians disingenuously claimed that the takeover was committed by “students.” That never washed, since the host country is ultimately responsible for the safety of all foreign embassies. It’s impossible to imagine that, had the Ayatollah wanted the hostages released, the students wouldn’t have quickly agreed.

Relations haven’t improved since then, even with the formal appeasement — known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action — during the Obama administration. Iran has been the leading state sponsor of terrorism with a reach as far as South America. Iranians have arrested visiting American journalists, businessmen and hikers, charging them with spying. It was Iran that orchestrated the barracks bombing at the Beirut airport that killed 241 Marines in 1983 as well as the bombing of the U.S. embassy in the same year.

The Iranians also hatched a plot to kill a Saudi diplomat at Washington, but authorities intervened before it was carried out. There are also the constant “Death to America” rallies. It should also be pointed out that it is against the United Nations Charter for a member state to threaten another member state.

Somehow, the UN overlooks this issue when it comes to Iran, which has consistently given the U.S. reasons why it cannot be trusted in anything, especially a deal intended to  stop its nuclear ambitions. For both the new generation that’s grown up without firsthand knowledge of these events, as well as those who lived through it, these facts bear remembering as negotiations proceed.