Delta Force (27 page)

THIRTY-FIVE

A LARGE PART
of the puzzle fell into place shortly afterward. General Vaught called with the news. His staff had found a place from which Delta and the freed hostages could be picked up once the choppers had flown them out of Teheran. This puzzle piece, thirty-minutes flying time from the capital, located between Teheran and the holy city of Qom, was called Manzariyeh. There, an asphalt-paved airstrip lay. Part of an unoccupied former bombing range, the strip assured the Air Force they could use C-130s, which were designated for the pickup. An Iranian Army engineer unit was known to be in the area, but it was not considered a serious threat. After all hell broke loose in Teheran, the airfield at Manzariyeh would have to be taken, secured, and held. A company-size Ranger contingent would undertake this mission.

General Vaught's news was well received at Camp Smokey's headquarters. At least now Delta had a plan to get out of Iran. There remained the issue of infiltration, getting in, and, for Delta, the larger task of taking down the embassy compound.

Another bit of news that was forwarded made Ishimoto's day. It was learned that photos of the compound would be made available. The photos began to come in at once and it gave the intel people a chance to compare movement within the compound with photos taken the day before, or the week before. If there were changes the analysts could arrive at some deductions. One photograph showed twenty automobiles
parked around the compound. If on the next day fifty were parked in the same area then something was happening and the message traffic might reveal what it was. If the analysts hadn't been alerted to the change by the photos they might not have spotted it in the cables.

One thing the photos pointed out was the existence of poles. Having assumed any American rescue attempt would use helicopters, either the IRG (Iranian Revolutionary Guards) or the militants had begun to place poles at all likely landing zones within the compound. Without the photographs, the intel shop would not have picked up this construction.

The photos, by themselves, were not going to take us to heaven. It was just one more element. What was truly needed was confirmation from a source on the scene.

The backup arrived at the end of December, a Christmas present for the planners, when the CIA managed to introduce an agent into the Iranian capital. Given the code name Bob, he was brought out of retirement for this mission. I was introduced to him. His mannerisms, the deliberate way he spoke, even his appearance, reminded me of Anthony Quinn playing Zorba the Greek. He was a very professional individual, and was prepared to do the job. He accepted all the risks and was confident he would succeed. I have since read that Bob and I were bitter enemies. I can't believe that. If we were, I didn't know it.

Between Christmas and the first of the year, based on Bob's answering the mail, Delta was able to get through enough information for the planners to frame a detailed assault plan. It was determined that the hostages were being held in not more than six buildings, maybe four, and these were identified. At first, based on the information gathered from the release of the thirteen hostages in November, we'd learned virtually all of the embassy's buildings might be used to house prisoners. Later in November, then in December, the analysts began to eliminate the number of buildings.

The analysts assumed the student militants who were holding the hostages were receiving assistance from the Palestinians
or the SAVAMA, which is the secret police organization. From the thirteen American hostages who were released it was learned that whenever they were moved they were blindfolded. They would also be shifted around into different groups, deliberately no doubt, so no patterns could be picked up. The militants could not be underestimated.

The process then became one of reasoning from a known to an unknown, from the general to the specific. Fifty-three prisoners needed to be housed and fed. With the help of psychiatrists provided by intelligence officers, the analysts felt that the student militants deep down inside did not want to hurt their hostages if they could avoid doing so. Therefore, what kinds of facilities existed within the compound to allow the hostages to be looked after?

Using deductive logic, two of the fourteen buildings were almost immediately eliminated from contention. Because there were no cooking facilities and the heating systems weren't the best, the motor pool and the general administration building were eliminated. Also, these two buildings were observable from a nearby fourteen-story building, and they abutted the compound wall which faced America Alley. The militants would not feel secure holding people in this area.

The intelligence people continuously used two words: probably, which meant better than a 50 percent chance, and possibly, which meant less than a 50 percent chance.

The old consulate building proved at first to be very confusing to the analysts. It was known that early in the takeover hostages were being held in there and continued to be held there until the thirteen were released. But again, it was determined it probably no longer held hostages. Not only did it border upon America Alley but Arak as well. Also, it did not have sleeping facilities. Lastly, the building was semihard, and the militants had continuing problems trying to open the electrically operated doors.

The four staff cottages were altogether another matter. These were bungalows intended to house either families, or two or three people who would come to the embassy on a temporary duty basis. There were no consistent reports from
sources being debriefed that there were hostages kept here. In any event, the staff cottages became a highly probable location for hostages.

Another building eliminated ran along the wall that abutted Kheradmand Alleyway. The alley dead ends at Arak on the south and runs north along the rest of the western side of the compound. This was an old structure whose north end contained the embassy's power plant, with the south end having previously been used by guards who had worked for the embassy. Again, because the building abutted an alleyway and was without cooking facilities and other amenities, it was eliminated.

It was hoped that the chancellery could be eliminated, but the wish proved ill-founded. A long, rectangular, three-story brick building, it ran east to west, or parallel to Takht-E-Jamshid Avenue. Located near the center of the south wall and in close proximity to the compound's main gate, it contained about ninety rooms. Although it did not include a kitchen, it certainly had enough secure rooms for the guards to house many of the hostages and at the same time keep them isolated from each other. The chancellery made the highly probable list. This was unfortunate, because it was a hardened building. There were security bars on all the lower-level windows and some upper-story windows contained shutters. It would be a damn hard building to get into. But to scope down from fourteen buildings to six or seven was a giant step. Specific tasks could be assigned and the number of operators actually needed for the job could now be realistically projected.

The vital importance of good, sound intelligence cannot be stressed enough. Without it there is nothing, with it there is something. It's the difference between failure and success, between humiliation and pride, between losing lives and saving them. Intelligence is to special operations as numbers are to a mathematician.

A telegram arrived at the Stockade. Dick Potter retransmitted it to me at Smokey. It was from Ulrich Wegener, the commander of GSG-9. “Charlie, am prepared to put in Teheran German TV crew. STOP. Would you like your people on it?
STOP.” I informed General Vaught of Ulrich's message and recommended we pursue the offer. Somewhere in the Pentagon the idea died.

“Hey, this German's my friend. He's figured out what's going on and has offered us his help.”

“This is too sensitive,” General Vaught was told to tell me. “We can't work with a foreign government on this.”

“But you don't understand. He's my friend. He knows Delta; he's visited with us. He knows how we operate and what we need. He'll help us.”

“You don't understand.”

Delta's intel section hoped the clergymen, when they returned from their Christmas visit to the hostages, were thoroughly debriefed. They might have been, but Delta never received any specific information it could be sure came directly from this source.

Even without hard specific facts, certain decisions involving the assault on the compound were made. How to get from the hide-site to the embassy on the second night? The helicopters could not fly the unit directly into Teheran. They were too noisy and voided any chance the mission would have of secrecy and surprise. The answer was obvious. Delta would be driven from the hideout through the capital in covered trucks. Someone within Teheran would have to make these arrangements. Bob was the natural choice.

Helicopter pilot training began as soon as possible. Several Sea Stallions were flown into Camp Smokey and they were followed by seven Navy crews.

These particular helicopters are peculiar-looking birds. They look more like huge hunchbacked hot dogs. Their main rotor assembly has blades that measure more than seventy-two feet across and remind you of oversized electric fans. I don't like them. I think all helicopters are ugly.

General Vaught and I flew with the Navy pilots their first time up. They had obviously been doing a lot of straightforward flying. They were very careful in everything they did. Their experience was in minesweeping operations and such skills did not lend themselves to those which would be required
for the rescue mission. When we landed, General Vaught looked at me and I smiled and shook my head. “I agree,” he said.

We were looking for aces, daredevils, barnstormers, guys who flew by the seats of their pants, hot rodders, pilots who could pick it up, turn it around on a dime, and put it back down with a flair. These Navy pilots didn't believe in taking the risks we knew were required of the pilots flying into an enemy-held city.

General Vaught thought the pilots should be given more time. Doc Bender, Delta's psychologist, carefully looked these chaps over. After the second day he came into the office. “You know, we got some guys here who are really shaky. They're beginning to understand what kind of mission you want them to fly. Sure, one or two might make it, but for the rest…” He shrugged.

Doc was proved right. During the following days it became apparent that these pilots were unable to fly in what is called “flight regime,” which is the tight formation pilots use to navigate without landmarks and to land in darkness.

One of them actually quit a few days into the training. He flat out refused to fly anymore. Scared. He admitted it. I understood that. But quitting. That was something else. He'd lost his motivation, his objectivity, and his desire. He'd also lost his balls. I recommended he be court-martialed. He was restricted to the area; after all, he knew about the effort to mount a rescue operation. Eventually he was taken away and isolated somewhere else. None of us wanted a quitter walking the streets knowing what he knew. One pilot was kept on for further training. Reportedly, the rest were sworn to secrecy and returned from whence they came.

General Vaught then took up the problem of the pilots with General Jones. The J-3 in the JCS at the time was a Marine lieutenant general named Phillip Shutler. Not surprising, therefore, a Marine unit of helicopter pilots was flown down to Camp Smokey for training. Six of these pilots and their crews came from the New River Air Station near Jacksonville, North Carolina, and two others arrived from a West Coast
Marine base. Many of us in Delta questioned the wisdom behind this decision.

Were these pilots the best-qualified men in Department of Defense? There was some suspicion at the time that there were those in the JCS who wanted to make sure
each of the services had a piece of the action
. Up till this point there had been no role for the Marines to play. General Vaught told me these pilots had all been thoroughly screened and had come from a unit with a good record. Also, a Marine Corps officer, Col. Chuck Pittman, took over the training of the pilots. He understood helicopter operations. Pittman was an experienced pilot who got to know the pilots well. Like any good officer he was strong-minded and it was obvious that he was respected by those who knew him. He got along well with Jim Kyle and seemed to be a good addition to the team.