1979 U.S. embassy burning in Islamabad
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In 1979, Pakistani students, enraged by a radio report claiming that the United States had bombed the Masjid al-Haram, Islam‘s holy site at Mecca, stormed the U.S. embassy in Islamabad, and burned it to the ground[1]. There actually had been a terrorist attack there, but the U.S. was not involved. The diplomats survived by hiding in a reinforced area, though Marine Security Guard Steve Crowley and another American were killed in the attack.
On 20 November 1979, a Saudi Arabian Islamic zealot group had led a takeover of the Mosque at Mecca. Iran’s Ayatollah Khomeini immediately claimed that Americans were behind the attack on Islam’s holiest place. This claim was repeated in media reports the morning of 21 November.
The event started as a small, peaceful protest against U.S. policies in Cambodia, as well as suspected U.S. involvement surrounding the military coup d’état of Zulfikar Bhutto in 1977. The protesters shouted anti-American slogans. Although, at first glance it seemed to be a small protest outside the embassy’s walls, buses later started pulling up filled with far-right Jamaat-i-Islami supporters in front of the main gates. Hundreds of people began climbing over the walls and trying to pull them down using ropes. According to an American investigation, after a bullet was fired at the gate’s lock by one rioter ricocheted and struck protesters, the protestors opened fire believing that an American marine on the roof of the embassy had fired first. Who actually fired first cannot be confirmed one way or another. Twenty-year-old Marine Steve Crowley was struck by a bullet and transported to the embassy’s secure communication vault along with the rest of personnel serving in the embassy. Locked behind steel-reinforced doors the Americans waited for help to come and rescue them from a smoke-filled building.
Two days later, The New York Times published an article titled “Troops Rescue 100 in Islamabad; U.S. Offices Are Burned in 2 Cities”.[2] The article mentions Jody Powell, the White House press secretary at that time who said that the administration appreciated action taken by the Pakistani Armed Forces in bringing about the dramatic escape of the 100 people besieged for five hours in the embassy chancery.
In that action: “The Government troops who finally ended the siege had to land on the roof by helicopter, rout the attackers and then assist the embassy personnel onto the roof, down to a lower level of the building and finally to the ground.”
A detailed narrative of this event is provided in the book Ghost Wars: The Secret History of the CIA, Afghanistan, and Bin Laden, from the Soviet Invasion to September 10, 2001 by Steve Coll.
[edit] See also
- 1983 Beirut barracks bombing
- Anti-Americanism
- US-Pakistan relations
- Steve Crowley
- Grand Mosque Seizure
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