'Saved by Beauty:' Tour of Iran is a tale of two nations

For most of my adult life, Iran and the United States have been at loggerheads. The hostage crisis unfolded during my junior year of college, and here now on the brink of my 56th year, anxiety about a nuclear Iran burns like a low-grade fever threatening to spike at any moment. In between there have been such momentous events as Iraq’s invasion of Iran with covert U.S. backing; the Iran-Contra Affair; Operation Praying Mantis, in which U. S. ships clobbered Gulf oil platforms and sank a handful of armed Iranian speedboats; the mistaken shoot-down of an Iranian passenger jet by the USS Vincennes; U. N. sanctions in retaliation for Iran’s sponsorship of terrorism; Bush’s famous “axis of evil” speech; and who knows how much espionage and secretive maneuvering by both governments on any number of fronts. A full-scale shooting war hasn’t happened yet, thank God, but the potential is certainly there.

It was against this unsettled backdrop that I recently picked up a copy of “Saved by Beauty: Adventures of an American Romantic in Iran” (Broadway, $24) by Roger Housden, an altogether refreshing reminder that though it may be a pariah state now, the land of Ahmadinejad boasts an ancient and sophisticated culture. Furthermore, and perhaps more importantly, the majority of its people are not bloodthirsty extremists bent on the destruction of the Great Satan but are rather warm, friendly, curious about the West and far more inconvenienced by their insufferable government than most Americans can even begin to imagine.

Housden, a San Francisco Bay-area resident who holds dual American and British citizenships, has long nourished a fascination with Iranian culture, especially its literature, embodied in the ethereal Sufi poetry of Rumi (1207-73) and Hafez (1325-90), and its architecture, manifested most beautifully in the blue dome of the Royal Mosque in Isfahan. Tired of all the ugliness and rhetoric dominating the airwaves, Housden decided to go to Iran himself and see how its art and culture and the people devoted to it were doing. As he writes, he wanted to get “beyond the slogans and the headlines; to touch the creative spirit of Iran and to be touched by it in turn.”

Traveling on his British passport, which was less likely to arouse suspicion than if he were to travel openly as an American, Housden arrived in Tehran, half expecting glowering, bearded revolutionaries brandishing AK-47s and grim women clad in black chadors. The reality couldn’t have been more different. “There were no guns,” he writes, “and no beards that I could see. The woman with the high boots and fitted jeans was just in front of me. As unconcerned as ever, she had now made the small concession of wearing a light silk scarf toward the back of her head. When it was my turn, the officer met me with a smile, looked briefly at my passport, and said, ‘Welcome to Iran!’ I looked up, surprised, a little taken aback. ‘Thank you,’ I said. ‘You’re welcome,’ he said.

Anniversary of Operation Praying Mantis and USS Samuel B. Roberts ...

I want to thank all my brothers and sisters who served and still serve in the Corps and in the Tin Can Navy on this fine anniversary of Operation Praying Mantis (18APR88).  My old senior chief, STGCS Carr, won the bronze star for leading the fireparty on the Sammy B.

On 18 April 1988, the US Navy executed Operation Praying Mantis, which was the largest surface US naval action since World War II. This operation was in retaliation for the Iranian mine that struck USS Samuel B. Roberts (FFG 58) on 14 April. US Navy ships and US Navy and Marine Corps aircraft efficiently and successfully struck Iranian oil platforms, sank the Iranian frigate Sahand and smaller boats, and damaged the Iranian frigate Sabalan

Photo 1:

Marines inspect a ZU-23 23mm automatic anti-aircraft gun on the Iranian Sassan oil platform. Marines attacked, occupied then destroyed the platform as part of Operation Praying Mantis which was launched after the guided missile frigate USS Samuel B. Roberts (FFG-58) struck a mine on April 14, 1988. Photographed by Cpl. John Hyp, 18 April 1988. DOD Still Media Photograph: DM-SN-93-00990

Photo 2:

Aerial view of one of the Iranian frigate, Sahand (F74), hit by the U.S. Navy in retaliation for attack on USS Samuel B. Roberts (FFG-58). USS Coronado (AGF-11) Persian Gulf Cruise Book, 1988. NHHC Navy Library, Cruise Book Collection

Sahand launched missiles at A-6Es and the Intruders replied with two Harpoons and four laser-guided Skipper bombs. This was followed by a Harpoon firing from Joseph Strauss. The weapons delivered against Sahand were successful. The loss of Sahand, one of Iran’s most modern ships, was not enough to stop the suicidal sorties of the Iranian Navy. A sister ship, Sabalan, fired on several A-6Es and VA-95 with surface-to-air missile. An Intruder responded by firing a laser-guided bomb that hit Sabalan and stopped her dead in the water

Here's something you'd find interesting from what Senior Chief Carr had told me.  The mine had cracked the superstructure of the frigate and was taking on water.  The order for 'Abandon Ship' had been issued by the Captain.  The Persian Gulf is scarier for the amount of sea snakes swimming in its waters than the large amount of sharks that the snakes share them with. The crew refused to obey the order to abandon ship.  Instead, a few intrepid sailors used degaussing cable to literally swim underneath the hull and tie the ship together.

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