Brzezinski’s dramatic idea was not adopted, but clearly the mood in the White House was testy. When Deputy Secretary of State Warren Christopher worried that daring Khomeini to broaden the conflict might just feed into the Shiite “martyrdom complex,” Harold Brown, the defense secretary, noted, “A man with a martyr complex rarely lives to be seventy-nine.”
In a long Saturday meeting at Camp David, with participants dressed casually before a roaring fire in the stone fireplace, the president approved a secret, very risky reconnaissance trip into Iran to put the final piece in place for a rescue mission. Brzezinski and General Jones, chairman of the joint chiefs, both argued that the rescue mission could work, provided no word of it leaked in advance. When Secretary of State Vance objected to further discussion of military action, which he had adamantly opposed from the start, Carter’s shifting mood showed.
“Should we wait another year then?” he asked Vance.
Vance agreed to support the reconnaissance mission because it made sense even from his perspective; if it ever became necessary to rescue the hostages, if Iran started show trials and executions, the better prepared Delta Force was, the more likely it could succeed.
On March 23, the ailing shah flew from Panama to Egypt, despite administration efforts to prevent it. President Anwar Sadat of Egypt offered the shah permanent sanctuary. The official reason for the move was that he needed surgery to remove a cancerous spleen. A Cairo newspaper reported that he had fled Panama when he learned of a secret American plot to poison him.
11. I’m Not Going to Answer Questions from Anyone Wearing a Dress!
On March 19, Richard Queen and Joe Hall were told that they were going to be moved later that day.
“We are going to move you to a better place,” the guard said. “This is a good thing. You should be very happy.”
They were not very happy. Like the others, both men found that change flung them into fear and uncertainty. Both dreaded the move, especially when they were told they were going to be separated.
“You are going to be with some very important people,” Queen was told. “I don’t want to go with any important people. I want to stay with Joe. We get along well. We want to stay together.”
They packed up their small stash of toiletries, letters, books, and Queen’s Civil War game that Hall refused to play—one look at the thick book of rules and instructions and he had backed down. Later that day they were led outside with blankets over their heads and placed in a car. They were driven around for about half an hour, mostly in circles. Both Hall and Queen knew they were still on the compound when they were let out. They were led inside a building and told to sit on the floor. From beneath his blanket Hall could see feet moving back and forth, shod guard feet and sandaled hostage feet. Then he was moved and told to sit someplace else, then someplace else. At last he was taken to a room and the blanket was removed…and standing across from him was Queen. They had not been separated after all. The room was on the top floor of the chancery, one that had been trashed on the day of the takeover and left that way. The smell of tear gas still clung to its walls like a bad memory. They asked for some supplies and set about cleaning. The guards gave them two big leather chairs, perfect for reading, and a table with a lamp. But no matter how bright and clean and pleasant the room was—they were both especially thrilled to have a window and actual sunlight—the lingering tear gas continued to sting their eyes. It got worse and worse until finally the guards moved them out to another room down the hall, a nicer one, which they promptly cleaned and arranged to their liking, hanging their snapshots and keepsakes on the walls. Then they were moved again.
This time they were placed in a basement chancery office that had belonged to Bruce German, the embassy budget officer. It was an ugly space with walls that had been stained by a burst pipe. This was where marines Jimmy Lopez and Steve Kirtley had given the guards such fits months earlier. They had drawn and painted slogans all over the walls. Lopez had written out patriotic lines in Spanish and drawn a giant eagle. Hamid the Liar brought them a big gum eraser and instructed the new tenants to remove the drawing, which had been done in thick pencil. Hall went to work on it, but found that the eraser wasn’t doing the job.
“Do it yourself,” he told Hamid.
“If you don’t remove it, you will be taken back to the Mushroom,” he said.
“In the warehouse there’s lots of paint and brushes,” said Queen. “Could you bring us some?”
They were given buckets of white paint and they went to work. They applied several coats, and before long the room looked clean and bright. The guards gave them a vacuum cleaner. They were given back the big leather chairs and a desk with a glass top with some shelving on it. Guards got into the spirit of the redecoration and supplied a few paintings they had earlier taken off the walls. Queen asked for a poster of Alaska he had hung in his office months earlier and they even found and delivered that. A table lamp provided soft light in the evenings. They had windows to let in sunlight and fresh air. They could hear birds outside. When spring came they left the window open to let in cool air at night but discovered that Tehran bred swarms of nasty mosquitoes. Killing them became a nightly competition.
The only downside was the protesters. All light and sound had been shut out of the Mushroom Inn, but now, restored to the surface world, the protesters, somewhat less in number but with no noticeable diminution of zeal, remained outside. It was as if the students needed to have a massive audience at all times. The demonstrations were supplemented by audio-tapes of earlier gatherings, and sometimes the tape would get stuck and the sound level would drop, revealing the relatively small size of the crowd. The guards hustled to fix it as though they were all living in a balloon that had just sprung a leak.
Hall and Queen were at last allowed to speak. They spent days going over everything that had happened since the takeover and every scrap of information they had about what was happening in Iran and the world. They reviewed all the things they and the others had done, or hadn’t done, and critiqued everything and everyone, including themselves.
With the holidays gone, there was nothing tangible to look forward to. The holidays had carried the hope of release, and once they were over their captivity stretched open-ended into the future. The change of scenery and the freedom to converse helped Queen rally from his post-Christmas depression, even with the worsening numbness of his left arm and side. He started an exercise program, walking around the room and doing calisthenics as well as he could, taking a cold shower afterward, and then plunging into his books.
Hall and Queen argued—no two men locked in the same room for months together could be entirely free of discord—but their disagreements never ran deep enough to last. With some of the hostages the arguments got ugly and occasionally turned into out-and-out fights and deep-rooted bitterness. Given the cramped and overall unsettling circumstances, and the constant discomfort, Hall and the gangly, bearded, ailing consular officer got along famously. After dinner each evening was the smoking hour. Hall had never been a pipe smoker, but Queen gave him one of the pipes Akbar had brought from his apartment and now Hall was hooked. When the lights went out they would switch on a soft lamp on their table and sit smoking and sipping tea and talking into the night.