Operation Eagle Claw 1980: The disastrous bid to end the Iran hostage crisis

Justin W. Williamson

Mar 2020 · Raid Kitap 52 · Bloomsbury Publishing

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Following months of negotiations after the seizure of the US Embassy in Tehran on 4 November 1979, President Jimmy Carter ordered the newly formed Delta Force to conduct a raid into Iran to free the hostages. The raid, Operation Eagle Claw, was risky to say the least. US forces would have to fly into the deserts of Iran on C-130s; marry up with carrier-based RH-53D helicopters; fly to hide sites near Tehran; approach the Embassy via trucks; seize the Embassy and rescue the hostages; board the helicopters descending on Tehran; fly to an airbase captured by more US forces; and then fly out on C-141s and to freedom. Unfortunately, and unsurprisingly given the complexity of the mission, things went wrong from the start and when the mission was called off at the refueling site at Desert One, the resulting collision between aircraft killed eight US personnel.

This title tells the full story of this tragic operation, supported by maps, photographs, and specially-commissioned bird's-eye-views and battlescenes which reveal the complexity and scale of the proposed rescue and the disaster which followed.

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Justin Williamson is a career US diplomat who has served in Iraq, Mexico, Spain, and the Democratic Republic of Congo. He has degrees from Texas Tech University, The University of Texas at El Paso, and has recently graduated from the US Army Command and Staff College with a Master of Military Arts and Sciences. He is based in Texas, USA.

Jim Laurier is a native of New England, growing up in New Hampshire and Massachusetts. He has been drawing since he could hold a pencil and throughout his life he has worked in many mediums creating artwork on a variety of subjects. He has worked on the Osprey Aviation list since 2000, and in that time he has produced some of the finest artwork seen in these volumes.He lives in New England, USA.