Posted on 07/24/2015 5:37:14 AM PDT by SJackson
“My last year in office was the most stressful and unpleasant of my life,” writes Jimmy Carter in his new memoir A Full Life: Reflections at Ninety. America’s 39th president hasn’t forgotten the root cause of the problem. “From November 4, 1979 American hostages were held captive by Iranian militants, supported by the Ayatollah Khomeini and his government.” For those who missed the Carter Era (1976-1980) there’s a bit more to it.
“This crisis was of overriding importance to me,” writes Carter, who does not explain that Iran held 52 American hostages for 444 days. He mentions not a single American hostage by name. The Iranian invasion of the U.S. embassy and the taking of the hostages was the clearest act of war against the United States since Pearl Harbor. So what was the response from America’s commander-in-chief?
“I sent a warning to the Ayatollah during the first month that I would close all access to Iran by the outside world if a hostage was harmed,” writes Carter, without explaining how he could do that. The USSR, then still in business, was one of many nations that did not follow instructions from the President of the United States. And even if he could close all access, Carter does not explain how that would resolve the crisis.
The Ayatollah, Carter explains, “took my warning seriously and was careful with the well-being of the Americans,” releasing one quickly “when his arm seemed to become paralyzed.” So even in a hostage situation, the Ayatollah Khomeini was someone Jimmy Carter could do business with. Carter says he told the Ayatollah he would “attack militarily if one was killed” but nothing came of that.
“Our goal was to free the hostages through diplomacy but we needed to be prepared for other alternatives.” After the hostages had been in captivity for two months, Carter planned a rescue mission with special forces and seven long-range helicopters. “The rescue team would then fly into Tehran at night, overwhelm the captors with as little violence as possible using night-vision equipment.” The hostages and rescuers “would helicopter to a nearby airport, where a large passenger plane would land and bring them to safety.” Everyone on Carter’s national security team agreed to the plan.
“Everything went as planned,” Carter writes, except that one helicopter returned to the carrier, another went down in a sandstorm, and another “ran into the C-130, damaging them both and killing eight crewmen.” Carter called it off and the hostages remained in captivity, a further humiliation to all Americans. The failed rescue, the former president writes, “had terrible political consequences for me,” with challenges from Ted Kennedy and Ronald Reagan, whom the sanctimonious Carter trashes throughout the book.
“Since I had refrained from exerting military force to punish the Iranians,” Carter writes, “the failure to secure the freedom of the hostages made me vulnerable to their allegations that I was an ineffective leader.” Actually, Kennedy and Reagan were both right. Carter was an ineffective leader, and American voters, many Democrats among them, thought so too.
Ronald Reagan crushed Carter in the 1980 elections and on January 20, 1981, the first day of Reagan’s presidency, the Ayatollah Khomeini’s Iranian regime released the 52 American hostages. Carter remains baffled, writing, “I have never known what caused the Ayatollah to delay granting their freedom until I was out of office.” For most readers, it won’t be a mystery. The Ayatollah Khomeini sized up Jimmy Carter as weak and unwilling to use military force. On the other hand, the Ayatollah remained uncertain what Ronald Reagan would do, so the Ayatollah turned the Americans loose on Reagan’s first day.
Readers of A Full Life might jump ahead to 2015. The Iranian regime is essentially unchanged, an imperialist Islamic theocracy still chanting “death to America,” “death to Israel,” still sponsoring terrorism, and still holding three, possibly four, Americans hostage. Like Carter in 1979, Barack Obama, heading into the home stretch of his presidency. And like Carter, he regards the Iranian regime as one he can deal with.
Obama has just negotiated a nuclear deal that will give the Ayatollahs everything they want, especially the lifting of sanctions. Even if the Iranian regime does not develop a nuclear weapon, that will enable them to buy one from Russia or some other nation. So what started as farce under Carter in 1979 could easily repeat as tragedy, big time, before Obama leaves office.
Meanwhile, Carter credits Mikhail Gorbachev’s glasnost and perestroika for ending the Cold War. Reagan had nothing to do with it. The former president’s observations on Cuba are also of interest.
“Many Cuban families are deprived of good income, certain foods, cell phones, access to the internet, and basic freedoms,” Carter explains, “but they have access to good education and health care and live in a tropical environment where the soil is productive and many houses are surrounded by fruit trees.”
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I was in the coal business when this miserable puke was turned out of office.
He had it coming.
Hey Jimmah—When you project that you’re a wuss (see Killer Rabbit Incident), certain people are going to exploit that fact.
America used to protect and punish countries that harmed U.S. citizens...that is no longer the case...now politicians (98% of them) are just interested in how much $ they can scam...BIG DIFFERENCE!
Jimmy’s idiocy and stupidity (yes he is both) seen in my intreptation of his final sentence in this article:
Keep me enslaved under communism but as along as I can “...live in a tropical environment where the soil is productive and many houses are surrounded by fruit trees.” I’m happy.
Don’t worry, Jimmy. You weren’t alone in that last year. It was the worst year of OUR lives too. So happy to have Reagan step in and show them what a manly man looks like.
I was active fleet sailor at the time, much contempt for Carter and crew. As an aside, one of the first things this idiot did upon taking office was to authorize an across the board pay cut for the active duty military. Typical lefty.
Poor Jimmy, it’s all about him.
You can tell though that its eaten him up since it happened. But not for the reasons most people would think.
Such is the case with all narcissists. Humiliation is the worst thing that can happen to them. With others it builds character. With them (Carter, Obama) its a fate worse than death.
The CORRECT thing to do would have been to send a message to the Ayatollah during the first HOUR that if all of the hostages (unharmed) were not on a U.S.-bound aircraft within 24 hours, then Tehran, and the rest of the country of Iran, would be in ruins within 48.
If he had told the Ayatollah that, and made sure the man knew he meant it, then I guarantee that all of the hostages (unharmed) would have been on a U.S.-bound aircraft within 24 hours.
Who needs freedom when you have good soil and fruit trees?
At least until 2009.
Carter has always been a jabbering jackass. This latest gibberish no exception.
Carter is an idiot. Plain and simple.
“My last year in office was the most stressful and unpleasant of my life...”
Really? All FOUR years were horrific for me and my family. What a putz. Go away, you old, useless, Socialist GOAT!
It’s hard to believe Zer0 is actually worse than Carter but he is.
And that is saying a lot.
Carter and his national security advisor Ziggy Brzizzi, argh!
Ziggy reminded me of JFK’s Sec of Defense, Robt. McNamara. Sounded authoritative and learned but was full of s#%t.
Some of Carter’s ‘gifts’ to us and the free world, assisting the downfall of the Shah of Iran, birth of all our trouble with that nation.
Giving away the Panama Canal, China steps in.
That doesn’t even address domestic. Does 13% mortgages ring a bell ? !!!
this: “ I warned the Ayatollah”
IS PURE FICTION- a lie that know one can verify-
He is a communist dupe who has shown again and again
he and his whole family HATE America-
Now gets a slight reprieve because of the TRUE hater
of all- America,Christians,Jews- is currently in
the White House.
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