Malcolm Kalp, a CIA officer who had arrived only four days before, told the group of meeting with David Rockefeller shortly before he had left the States. Rockefeller had been one of the powerful Americans who, along with former Secretary of State Henry Kissinger, had lobbied hard for President Carter to admit the shah. Kalp said that Rockefeller had told him, “I hope I haven’t caused you all too many problems.” From around Laingen’s conference table came the laugh of the powerless. Clearly this group lacked the clout to compete with the combined influence of Kissinger and Rockefeller, and the latter’s belated words of concern for them rang hollow. But few in this room felt bitter about it. Most of those now stationed in Tehran, especially professionals like Limbert, Tomseth, Metrinko, CIA station chief Tom Ahern, and his two officers, Kalp and Bill Daugherty, as well as the military liaisons and aides, were comfortable with risk. Some were motivated by patriotism, some by ambition, and some, especially the lower-level State Department communicators and staffers, for the danger pay—Tehran was a 25 percent differential post, meaning one earned a full fourth more than the usual pay. For some it was a chance to escape a failing marriage or family obligations that had become too onerous. Many of them were in Tehran precisely because they sought exotic or dangerous postings. The tension created esprit among those who could rise above it; it made everyone’s job seem all the more vital and rare. Yet not everyone could rise above it.
Some of those in this room periodically approached youthful, muscular Al Golacinski, the embassy’s security chief, to ask for his assessment of the risk, weighing whether to stay on or quit and clear out. He was always reassuring. Golacinski felt they had turned the corner. After the violent February invasion, the compound had been patrolled for months by a band of roguish local gunmen whom he had finally managed to ease out. Anxiety remained, but he felt events were coming under control. Golacinski expected continued demonstrations and thought there might even be occasional, isolated assassination attempts—a German diplomat had been gunned down in Tehran weeks earlier. But these were low-percentage risks. He personally assured everyone who asked that another invasion was unlikely and advised them to ride it out. To buttress his argument he made a point of keeping up a brave, confident front.
Just that morning he had averted a potential showdown. A local khomiteh, a gang of armed young men who dispensed revolutionary justice in the neighborhood, had shown up to complain about the removal of a large Khomeini poster that had been hung on Roosevelt Gate during the big demonstration. Golacinski had defused the encounter by tracking down the poster—it had been taken down by Navy Commander Donald Sharer, who thought it would make a nifty wall decoration for the marines’ new bar. Golacinski returned it and extracted a promise that it would not be hung where it obscured the view of embassy guards. He told the story at the morning meeting, the point being that confrontation, if well handled, could be peacefully resolved.
Limbert then talked about his trip south, promising a more complete written report, and the discussion turned to the “Students Day” demonstration planned for that morning. Some of those present thought that the embassy should be closed for the day to avoid trouble, but others argued against it. Tomseth wanted to keep the embassy open.
“If we close the embassy down every time there’s a demonstration in Tehran we would be closing down just about every day,” he said.
This opinion prevailed. There was some debate over whether to acknowledge the day of official mourning by flying the Stars and Stripes at half-mast before the chancery, and it was decided not to do so. In light of the attempt to steal the flag off the pole, lowering it halfway might tempt another try. Golacinski briefed the meeting on what to expect. There was already a crowd of about 150 to 200 people outside Roosevelt Gate, and they had been peaceful so far. The big rally was expected to draw together various rival elements among the revolutionary student groups, the more numerous religious conservatives from various universities around the city, and the smaller but better-organized leftists who were centered mostly at the University of Tehran. Because the street out front led directly to the university, large crowds of students marching toward the rally would be passing by the embassy all morning, which would mean more noise and the usual chanting and nastiness. Still, Golacinski said, the protest “is not aimed at us.”
To Iranians, Aban the thirteenth had an additional significance that went unnoted by the American staff. It was the fifteenth anniversary of the day the shah had exiled the Ayatollah Khomeini.
Laingen concluded the meeting by announcing that he had an appointment at the Foreign Ministry that morning, so he and Tomseth would be away for a few hours. Golacinski advised his assistant, Howland, who would accompany Laingen to the Ministry, to avoid streets around the University of Tehran on their way.
As he walked back down the corridor to his office, Limbert decided against visiting the barber. It would keep him from his office for several hours and he didn’t feel right getting a haircut on government time. Instead, he would start writing up his report of the trip.
Michael Metrinko was just arriving for work. He ignored the larger-than-usual crowd outside the east-side entrance. The protests were often worse later in the morning. Metrinko was a night owl and was customarily one of the last to show up. He did his real work after hours, meeting with Iranians, eating, drinking, smoking, and talking, trying to figure things out. As he saw it, that’s what his job was about. And what a fascinating job it was.
For a student of politics, being in Tehran just then was like being a geologist camped on the rim of an active volcano. Iran had gone temporarily insane. Revolution gives ordinary people the false belief that they can remake not just themselves, their country, and the whole wide world but human nature itself. That such grand designs always fail, that human nature is immutable, that everyone’s idea of perfection is different—these truths are all for a time forgotten. Those in the grip of righteousness saw the opportunity—no, the need—to weed the impure from their new and glorious garden. It started as always with the officials of the overthrown regime, authors of the criminal past, who were given show trials and marched out in the streets or to rooftops to be shot or hanged. With the taste of blood, the executioners then turned on those who had merely collaborated with the old order or its foreign sponsors or allies. Next, as former revolutionary brothers vied for permanent power, the killing turned inward.
This was where things had arrived after nine months. Various political and religious streams had joined in the exciting years before, Islamist fanatics, nationalist democrats, European socialists, Soviet-sponsored communists…they had all allied to bring down the shah. Now they were eyeing one another dangerously. The competition was not academic; it was a matter of life and death. The losers were being imprisoned, assassinated, or marched to the rooftop shooting galleries, outmaneuvered and denounced as traitors and spies. Tehran was a cauldron of intrigue, mysterious factions, uprisings, plots, clandestine maneuvers. Clerics considered too liberal were being gunned down in the streets by their more radical brothers, and some considered too conservative were being killed by violent leftists; Khomeini was cracking down on women who ignored the new mandates for hijab, traditional Islamic dress; the Kurds were rebelling in the northwest. This was the big leagues, people playing politics for keeps, reinventing themselves and their country, borrowing from Marx, from Jefferson, from Muhammad. And Metrinko wasn’t on the sidelines, either, he was right in the middle of things. While others studied the dynamics of political upheaval in libraries, he was present for one, and this revolution was particularly intriguing and original. He would describe it to his friends at home as “Delightful chaos with lots of blood!”