Tabas Fog

Marjan Mahdipoor
Translated by Mandana Karimi

2025-4-7

Ebham-e Tabas: Ramzgoshayi az ja’beh siah-e tahajom nezami Amrika (Tabas Fog: Decoding the Black Box of the U.S. Military Invasion) is the title of a recently published book by Shadab Asgari. After the Islamic Revolution, on November 4, 1979, students seized the US embassy in Tehran and a number of US diplomats were imprisoned. The US army carried out “Tabas Operation” or “Eagle’s Claw” in Iran on April 24, 1980, ostensibly to free these diplomats, but it failed. Some research have published about this military attack. Tabas Fog tries to remove the ambiguities and untold stories of this operation by historical analysis.

The book has six chapters. It begins by publisher’s foreword and then we have the necessities of a strategic view of history and historiography by Hamidreza Esmaili (PhD), Professor of Philosophy at Imam Hossein University and then the author expresses the necessities and goals of this research in his introduction.

The first chapter by the title “Changing attitude and behavior of the US” includes important events in US-Iran relations in 1977-1979. This chapter  includes: Carter’s visit to Iran, the behavior of the US during the revolution; the escape of three Americans from the prison and creation of a false belief; the belief of the Iranian people about the US; the conduct of Imam Khomeini in relation to the Muslim countries; the views of three Western politicians; the Iranian revolution and the conditions in the region.

“The U.S. Embassy in Iran” is the title of the second chapter. In this chapter, the author refers to the history of attacks on embassies around the world and then discusses the US embassy seizure in Tehran and tells why it happened. This chapter discusses the US reactions on political and economic issues. At the end of the chapter, the author points out that the US officials by using Imam Khomeini’s order to “try and punish the hostages,” tried to justify their military operation in public opinion.

The third chapter is “Preparations to carry out the Military Operation”. In this chapter, the author presents the US staff and line measures for the attack on Tabas and talks about the history of similar military actions. Special military operations in the U.S. military invasion of Tabas; the formation of the Delta Group; the Eagle’s Claw military operation; intelligence gathering; the role of US military advisors; conducting appropriate exercises for the operation; planning the operation; and estimating casualties are other topics that have been discussed in this chapter.

“Eagle’s Claw Operation” is the fourth chapter of the book. In this chapter, Asgari explains the beginning of the operation, i.e., the US flights to the region; the entry into Egypt, Oman, and finally Iran. The advent of war, the operation day, the flight of helicopters, how the US planes entered Iran using radar blind spots, and the collision of helicopters with sandstorms, are the topics discussed in this chapter. Tabas Airport conditions; the reason behind the cancellation of the mission; the collision; the Soviets role in Tabas incident; statements of Lt. Gen. Azarbarzin; the Iranian armed forces deeds this incident; Carter’s speech after the defeat; Imam Khomeini’s message after the US attack; the opinion of the commander of the operation, and  shooting the helicopters on April 25 are the other parts surveyed by the author in this chapter.

The fifth chapter deals with the “bold margins of the text” and the impact of ancillary issues on this event. This chapter includes: Iran’s political and security conditions at the time of the military attack; the statements by civil and military officials; observance of security issues by the US; order of shooting; Christian fundamentalism and the US foreign policy; Middle East policies; spread of militarism; religious orientation of US Presidents; concepts and meanings of the names in Tabas Operation; memorial day of the operation, Superpowers’ alignment and coordination.

The final chapter is “Where the Eagle Sheds Feathers”. At the beginning of this chapter, the author describes the representation of Operation Delta in the US media, and then deals with the rescue mission and the reason for the defeat from the perspective of Warren Christopher. The report of the high-ranking US military and the translated abstract of the report including the general description of the story, the analysis and the conclusion are the other parts of this chapter.

In the final parts of the book, the chronology of the US military attack on the Tabas desert from January 16^th 1979 to January 21^st 1981 is presented in a detailed table with a description of the event.

The documents are in the continuation of the sixth chapter. Sources, including Persian and English books, Iranian and foreign newspapers and publications, interviews, websites, and Iranian and foreign news agencies have a detailed list. Index is the last part of the book.

Iran Publications Company published Tabas Fog: Decoding the Black Box of the U.S. Military Invasion in 520 pages in 2023. One of the features of this book is using foreign sources such as essays, thesis, documentary films, websites photographs, and confidential interviews declassified after 1992 with the cooperation of Iranian documentary and judicial centers.