Customer Reviews

The Crisis: The President, the Prophet, and the Shah-1979 and the Coming of Militant Islam

5 star:		(6)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

This is an excellent book because it puts a pivotal period into sharp focus. Consider that, in the 70's, Nixon had been removed. The Republican ascendancy had hit a major speed bump. Carter edged out Morris Udall for the Democratic nomination, but Carter was a man with no experience whatsover in Washington politics. As Carter stumbled through his single term, the Iranian hostage crisis emerged to, ultimately, finish him off.

Of course, Iran and the Middle East are still a major problem for the US. This book goes a long way toward explaining why. It does not get very deeply into why we were tied to the Shah, but it's clear the Shah was not a gifted leader. His troubles were quite complex. Carter wanted a 'moral' foreign policy that respected human rights. He hoped he could work with the Shah to get gradual change in Iran, but he was also pathologically naive about how his support of the Shah might work out. The Iranians were not impressed. With the Shah, Carter and the Dems lost their share of the 'beacon of democracy' vision, and now Bush seems to own it.

There are two major threads in this book, aside from the gripping historical narrative. First off, there is a sense of tragic farce that can almost be seen as whimsical in hindsight. How could everything go wrong. And I mean everything. From the inability of the UN Secretary General to follow a plan, to the failed surgery by a brilliant heart surgeon, to the sequence of failure in the desert rescue mission. Then there was the emissary going back to Tehren, to finalize the release, on the day Iraq invaded, thus delaying flights for 2 weeks. It just goes on and on and on. In the epilogue, someone is quoted as saying Carter was a man who used up all his luck becoming president. This is a book about a talented man who, indeed, had no real luck. His final bargaining chip was being able to tell the Iranians "Well, in 10 weeks you can negotiate with Reagan." That seemed to be enough, although Iran badly needed war materiel, as well. One can (should) ask if Nixon and Kissinger were setting Carter up, in various ways. They insisted the Shah come here. That precipitated the crisis. But why did Carter have Vance and Brzrzinski, perhaps a more bipolar pair than Rumsfeld and Powell. The extremes did not create any kind of viable policy. The weakness was shown when Russia went into Afghanistan. With Reagan, we got the hard right.

The other fascinating thread is the whole 'democratic' and revolutionary process in Iran. Revolutions have a nasty way of getting, well, nasty. This one got fractured and violent. It had spurts of energy and then things would dissipate. The people with power behaved like politicians, but they felt a need to succeed beyond this giant media event. The clerics were difficult to work with, especially Khomeini, and as the situation unraveled, the fundamentalist religious factions filled the political vaccuum. The people involved were not demons, entirely. They did hate the US, in many ways, which was somewhat understandable. They could not create a viable government or maintain the economy. Unfortunately, the process of weighing secularism, Islam, law, and so on, was not very successful, and we still see the effects. There's something to learn about bringing democracy to the rest of the world. It just ain't that easy. The events in this book are still with us. In the Fall of 1980, as Reagan and Carter were campaigning, Iraq invaded Iran. Partly this was due to the inability of Iran to form a strong government. Partly THIS was due to the hostages and the emotionalism wrapped up in the Shah who had, actually, just died. The Iranians needed to focus on something other than the Great Satan. We, of course, ended up giving some support to Iraq and propping up Saddam. (How did that work out?)

Now we would like to see democracy in Iraq, but the same kinds of political and religious winds blow across Iraq, and democracy is only a process, not a solution.

One can isolate out the period of American foreign policy where we protected our economic interests, and the interests of the Cold War paradigm. Carter certainly championed a different focus, but without defining a process to get there. In Iran, a country where our 'legacy policy' had to be unwound, everything just imploded. We were on the wrong side of the thing, and couldn't get right with it. One can also look at the various issues that must be resolved to have a pluralistic and enlightened form of democracy in the Sunni-Shia, Kurdish, and Islamist, etc, Middle East. Because ultimately the Hostage Sideshow deflected the Iranians from the task of making their country work, and the revolutionary ideology continues to corrode real advance.

The Crisis is a must read for anyone interested in the situation in the Middle East today. David Harris has written an insightful, informative book on the three leaders who were involved in the Iranian hostage take-over. It is the best written book I have read on the subject. The book is clearly written and with such sensitivity that I didn't want to put it down. By focusing in on the personalities of President Carter, the Ayatollah Khomeinni and the Shah of Iran, I came away with a much better understanding of the three men and the incredible mistakes and misunderstandings that can happen in the world of international politics. Harris writes with a dramatic and visual flare that makes it a pleasure to read.

Judith Dwan Hallet
Documentary Filmmaker

Though I was only seven at the time of the Iran Hostage Crisis, I can vividly remember how the Crisis touched everyone in America as I observed in my household. I remember the nightly new and papers menioning the three players highlighted in this work. With the exception of Carter, I knew very little about these three before picking up this book.

Harris provides the reader with a detailed account of each leaders rise to and/or fall from power. In a coup of thorough research, Harris attempts to lay out every twist and turn in the international negotiations to release the hostages. Though the subtitle mentions only Carter, the Shah, and Khomeni, Harris details the actions of numerous other players who interact with the three leaders and influence the course of events in Tehran.

The pace of the narrative is like that of an excellent thriller. Harris cuts back and forth between Washington, Paris, Tehran, and the carious locations of the Shah. He does an excellent job in capturing the emotions of the folks involved. The description of the disastrous rescue attempt is fantastic and exemplifies how small things can derail military operations. Harris also concentrates on how a world leader--be it the shah, president, or the Secretary General of the UN--has to be extremely careful in how he or she speaks.

One thing I really liked about this work is the final chapter in which Harris details what has happened to each person we met along the way. In so many works of non-fiction and history, we are introduced to folks who are dropped from the focus of the author.

Ultimately, this is an important work because it looks at the birth of the hatred of the United States espoused by militant Islams. It is fascinating and disturbing to think that this incident that brought down the presidency of Carter was initially to be a three day "statement" by a group of students in Tehran.

This well written book brought back unpleasant memories of America's first ignominious encounter with radical Islam. I was just out of high school, and can vividly recall the national despair and exasperation over the hostage crisis. In many ways, 1979-80 was the nadir of our post-Vietnam national funk.

Harris' book provides an excellent window on the hostage crisis, and the machinations in Washington and Tehran to resolve it. Harris portrays most Carterites in sympathetic terms (perhaps no surprise considering the author's leftist politics), especially Ham Jordan, whose secret, trans-continental diplomatic efforts had him functioning as a de facto Secretary of State. Brzezinski is cast in a much less flattering light, and is derided for his hawkish posture. It's interesting that Harris chose not to (or was unable to) interview Carter's National Security Advisor. The diplomacy advocates Vance and Christopher come across as naive in their aversion to military force or coercion of any kind.

On the Iranian side, Bani Sadr (president) and Ghotbzadeh (foreign minister) are gullible in the extreme. From their days together in exile in Paris, it is clear that Khomeini was using these moderates to mask his extremism and advance his legitimacy internationally. The Shah ("His Imperial Majesty," "Light of the Aryans," etc) is venal and weak, although when the moment of truth arrived, he blanched at unleashing the Iron Fist to quell the rebellion.

UN Secretary General Kurt Waldheim is untrustworthy and through arrogance, incompetence or both, did more than anyone to undermine the secret Jordan-Ghotbzadeh agreement to spring the hostages.

The book is a surprisingly brisk read, given the weightiness of the subject matter. The author's decision to focus primarily on a small number of key players certainly helped speed the narrative pace. But I was a little put off this technique. For example, the State Department official who participated in Jordan's diplomatic gambit is referred to repeatedly as "the Assistant Secretary of State" - no name, ever, is associated with him. I kept wondering who this mystery diplomat was. Other characters are referred to generically as "the NSC official" or "State's Iran specialist."

The author also errs in the epilogue when he asserts that Warren Christopher served as President Clinton's Secretary of State for eight years -- what about Madeleine Albright? These mild criticisms aside, "The Crisis" is an excellent read and highly informative.

The Hostage Crisis was one of the more dismal episodes in recent American history. It helped to fell a sitting president, underscored the perception of American impotence and served as a capstone to the nation's decade-long diminishment on the world stage.

If you enjoy historical writing that tells a story instead of hitting you over the head with numerous footnotes and citations, this is the book for you. Long before Al-Queda the US was forced to deal with Islamic Terrorism in the late-70's, and this book does a great job in explaning how it all happened.

The writer, David Harris does a great job in extrapolating information from existing sources and a number of interviews with people who were involved in the crisis both in and out of the Carter Administration. The strength of this book is his retelling of the human toll of the crisis and how a number of strong personalities were forced to work with one another.

For those of us who remember this time in history, it appeared as if the Carter Administration seemingly bumbled every possible opportunity in addressing the crisis. The book explains how it happened by examining what took place and who was involved both in Iran and the United States. Thanks to his work, we get a better idea of what many hitorical figures such as Jimmy Carter, Khomeni, Zbignew Breziniski and Cyrus Vance were like.

As a result, I came away from this book leaning something and enjoying the reading while I gained the information. Solid book that's worth your time.

This is a fine book. The research is thorough, and the writing is compelling -- there really are no lulls in the narrative. (My only quibble is with the author's alternating use of first names and surnames throughout the text. Somehow, it just doesn't quite work.)

I know, a lame title for my review, but it neatly sums up David Harris's "The Crisis." This richly detailed, insightful book provides both a panoramic and microscopic level of detail into not only the Iranian Hostage Crisis but the geopolitical forces that were coming together in the late 1970s that bore fruit on Sept. 11, 2001.

As an opening comment, the portrayal of decision making in the Carter Administration is both exhaustive and maddening. Carter comes off as a caring, if wobbly leader who shows great courage and leadership one moment and jellyfish spine the next. Harris does a great job of giving the reader background into the US relationship with the Shah and our diplomacy in that region during the 1970s.

After Carter is elected and the Shah's hold on power becomes more tenuous, the coil unravels and we see the seeds of the hostage taking planted. Indeed, as The Shah (or as Harris annoyingly refers to HIM) teeters on the brink of losing control of his country, Carter's political tin ear (and Zbig's awful advice) start the downward spiral. Zbig comes off poorly as he continues to argue for blind loyalty and support for the Shah even as the political winds are turning into hurricanes in Iran. Even more disheartening is a little remembered attack on the embassy NINE MONTHS before the full scall takeover that should have served as a not so subtle hint that our policies needed to change or we risked reaping the whirlwind. Harris neatly ties together the Shah's nomadic odyssey after he leaves Iran with the effect Carter's allowing him into the US triggers among the radicalized students in Iran.

Once the hostages are taken, the feckless and toothless response of our government will make any Democrat hang his head in shame and cause them to understand why that party is viewed as "soft." Instead of taking immediate and aggressive action (i.e. release hostages or your country ceases to exist) the Carterites engage in endless months of negotiation without any apparent understanding of the "negotiating" strategy so common in the Arab World. That being said, some of the book's most interesting chapters involve Carter CoS Ham Jordan's back door negotiations with French liasions to the Iranian government. The clock and dagger elements of their meetings are really enjoyable. That said, the Carter folks showed little to no grasp of how to negotiate, constantly agreed to extend deadlines, saw hope in false starts and in short, could have, with a quick call to Tom Friedman, who was reporting for the NYT at that time from Lebanon understood how they were being toyed with.

When Carter does green light military action it ends in tragedy and the US looks even weaker. The disheartening loss of life and the limp support of Cy Vance (he resigned in private before the attack commenced, making it public two days after the tragedy) are not some of our nation's finest moments. Indeed, the hostage crisis largely ends because the utility the hostages had as symbols of US turgidity pale in comparison to the internal strife in Iran and (TRUE IRONY) the invasion of that country by none other than Saddam Hussein (yes, Virginia the very man who has cost us 1300+ lives and 200 billion dollars is the same guy who indirectly got our hostages freed).

On the macro level, what is even more frustrating about this episode is that we learned few if any lessons from it. Little is spoken of with regard to adding Arabic agents to the CIA, strengthening intelligence on the ground, analyzing why the hostages were taken in the first place, etc. Indeed, some of the main players (particularly Warren Christopher, whose final efforts to seal the release were heroic) ended up right back in the next Democratic administration. Don't get me wrong, the brief cameo that the Reagan folks make in this narrative is not good, as Harris details the efforts of William Casey to cultivate leakers within the Carter White House, steal debate briefing books, and *possibly* negotiate with the Iranians to NOT release the hostages before election day. These tactics will sound very familiar to anyone who know about the "win at all costs" tactics of our current administration. This in addition to the efforts of Kissinger and David Rockefeller to lean on Carter to allow the Shah admission to the US in the first place show that poor decision making occurred in both parties.

It is clear that radical Islamists took from this experience the idea that we could be cowed and that thought was reinforced four years later when 240 Marines were killed in Beirut and Reagan withdrew, when hostages were taken in Beirut and held for years on end, when Reagan Admin. officials traded arms for hostages, and carried on into the Bush and Clinton years.

This book IS a must read for anyone who wants to not only revisit a particularly dim chapter in our nation's history, but understand some of the roots of 9/11.

There is a natural fascination with what may be happening behind the scenes, and that certainly extends to what secret diplomacy may have been underway to resolve such an urgent crisis as that of the 1979 seizure of the hostages at the U.S. embassy in Tehran. Harris, formerly a contributing editor at the New York Times Magazine and Rolling Stone, provides much interesting material about the various diplomatic initiatives. He is strongest in writing about the middle of the crisis, rather than the early days or the final resolution, which have been the subject of several detailed (and more authoritative) accounts[4] as well as much conspiratorial nonsense. Harris gives particularly interesting accounts of the role of Iranian foreign minister Sadegh Ghotbzadeh, who wrongly thought he knew what would persuade Iran's revolutionary leaders to let the hostages go; he ended up under arrest and was executed for his role in a plot to overthrow the government. Harris also highlights the role of private citizen Henry Kissinger as an intermediary with Shah Mohammed Reza Pahlavi.

But The Crisis suffers from some serious problems. Harris provides no indication of his sources for particular statements. And in his afterward about his sources, he acknowledges that some quotes come "from multiple sources, which I have bound together inside a single set of quotation marks." He lists an impressive set of interviews, including many in Iran, as well as extensive use of primary source materials. But he also acknowledges "a special debt to the work of Gary Sick, William Shawcross, Pierre Salinger, and Amir Taheri"-three of whom have written books full of unsubstantiated innuendo that rely heavily on fabricated sources.

Furthermore, Harris's title misleads. He barely discusses the origins of militant Islam as a political movement. His account is not so much about the three main actors cited in the title-President Jimmy Carter, Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, and the shah-as about the maneuverings of their top aides. The failure to deliver what the title implies is particularly important when one reflects upon how little result there was from the secret diplomacy on which Harris concentrates. In fact, the hostages were taken so that Iran's revolutionaries could isolate their erstwhile allies in the Westernized wing of the anti-shah movement and consolidate Iran's anti-American orientation; once that purpose had been accomplished, the hostages were released. The diplomatic maneuverings did more to prolong the crisis, by suggesting that the United States was too timid to react strongly, than to end it.