page_title: Iran hostage crisis
section_title: Hostage conditions
hierarchical_section_title: Iran hostage crisis / The 444-day crisis / Hostage conditions
caption_attribution_description: English: A group photograph of the Iran hostage crisis former hostages in the hospital. The 52 hostages were spending a few days in the hospital after their release from Iran prior to their departure for the United States. Location: WIESBADEN AIR BASE
context_page_description: The Iran hostage crisis was a diplomatic standoff between the United States and Iran. Fifty-two American diplomats and citizens were held hostage for 444 days from November 4, 1979, to January 20, 1981, after a group of Iranian college students belonging to the Muslim Student Followers of the Imam's Line, who supported the Iranian Revolution, took over the U.S. Embassy in Tehran.
  Western media described the crisis as an "entanglement" of "vengeance and mutual incomprehension." American President Jimmy Carter called the hostage-taking an act of "blackmail" and the hostages "victims of terrorism and anarchy." In Iran it was widely seen as an act against the U.S. and its influence in Iran, including its perceived attempts to undermine the Iranian Revolution and its longstanding support of the Shah of Iran, Mohammad Reza Pahlavi, who was overthrown in 1979.
  After Shah Pahlavi was overthrown, he was admitted to the U.S. for cancer treatment. Iran demanded his return in order to stand trial for crimes that he was accused of committing during his reign. Specifically, he was accused of committing crimes against Iranian citizens with the help of his secret police.
context_section_description: The hostage-takers, declaring their solidarity with other "oppressed minorities" and "the special place of women in Islam," released one woman and two African Americans on November 19. Before release, these hostages were required by their captors to hold a press conference in which Kathy Gross and William Quarles praised the revolution's aims, but four further women and six African-Americans were released the following day. The only African-American hostage not released that month was Charles A. Jones, Jr. One more hostage, a white man named Richard Queen, was released in July 1980 after he became seriously ill with what was later diagnosed as multiple sclerosis. The remaining 52 hostages were held until January 1981, up to 444 days of captivity.
  The hostages were initially held at the embassy, but after the takers took the cue from the failed rescue mission, the detainees were scattered around Iran in order to make a single rescue attempt impossible. Three high-level officials – Bruce Laingen, Victor L. Tomseth, and Mike Howland – were at the Foreign Ministry at the time of the takeover. They stayed there for some months, sleeping in the ministry's formal dining room and washing their socks and underwear in the bathroom. At first, they were treated as diplomats, but after the provisional government fell, their treatment deteriorated. By March, the doors to their living space were kept "chained and padlocked."
  By midsummer 1980, the Iranians had moved the hostages to prisons in Tehran to prevent escapes or rescue attempts and to improve the logistics of guard shifts and food delivery. The final holding area, from November 1980 until their release, was the Teymur Bakhtiar mansion in Tehran, where the hostages were finally given tubs, showers, and hot and cold running water. Several foreign diplomats and ambassadors – including former Canadian ambassador Ken Taylor – visited the hostages over the course of the crisis and relayed information back to the U.S. government, including dispatches from Laingen.
  Iranian propaganda stated that the hostages were "guests" and were treated with respect. Asgharzadeh, the student leader, described the original plan as a nonviolent and symbolic action in which the "gentle and respectful treatment" of the hostages would dramatize to the world the offended sovereignty and dignity of Iran. In America, an Iranian chargé d'affaires, Ali Agha, stormed out of a meeting with an American official, exclaiming: "We are not mistreating the hostages. They are being very well taken care of in Tehran. They are our guests."
  The actual treatment was far different. The hostages described beatings, theft, and fear of bodily harm. Two of them, William Belk and Kathryn Koob, recalled being paraded blindfolded before an angry, chanting crowd outside the embassy. Others reported having their hands bound "day and night" for days or even weeks,  long periods of solitary confinement, and months of being forbidden to speak to one another or to stand, walk, or leave their space unless they were going to the bathroom. All of the hostages "were threatened repeatedly with execution, and took it seriously." The hostage-takers played Russian roulette with their victims.
  One, Michael Metrinko, was kept in solitary confinement for months. On two occasions, when he expressed his opinion of Ayatollah Khomeini, he was punished severely. The first time, he was kept in handcuffs for two weeks, and the second time, he was beaten and kept alone in a freezing cell for two weeks.
  Another hostage, U.S. Army medic Donald Hohman, went on a hunger strike for several weeks, and two hostages attempted suicide. Steve Lauterbach broke a water glass and slashed his wrists after being locked in a dark basement room with his hands tightly bound. He was found by guards and rushed to the hospital. Jerry Miele, a CIA communication technician, smashed his head into the corner of a door, knocking himself unconscious and cutting a deep gash. "Naturally withdrawn" and looking "ill, old, tired, and vulnerable," Miele had become the butt of his guards
caption: A group photograph of the fifty-two hostages in a Wiesbaden hospital where they spent a few days after their release.
exif: {}