In 1979, Iranian militants stormed the American embassy in Tehran and captured dozens of American, holding them hostage for 444 days. Six Americans escaped and hid in the home of the Canadian ambassador. A top-level CIA officer named Antonio Mendez devised an ingenious yet incredibly risky plan to rescue them before they were detected. You can read more in Argo: How the CIA and Hollywood Pulled Off the Most Audacious Rescue in History.
The first chapter is great look at the history of the United States’ involvement in Iran. It’s riddled with U.S. mistakes, largely because the singular focus was keeping Iran out of the hands of the Soviets. As a result, the U.S. propped up malicious dictators. That lead to rise of the ayatollahs and the 1979 uprising to overthrow the bad government. The hatred towards the US was because of the bad actions of the U.S.
While the embassy was being stormed, a handful of embassy workers escaped out a side door and fled to the Canadian embassy to hide. The hostages in the embassy were trapped, but the escapees had a chance to get out of Iran. If they could only come up with a plan.
It was CIA operative Antonio Mendez who comes up with the plan. His area of specialty is documentation. They’ll need good, fake paperwork to get out of Iran and avoid the clutches of the Revolutionary Guard.
The rescue attempt is the best part of the book. It’s what inspired Argo, the movie. I loved the movie. The book came out after the movie. It’s written by Tony Mendez, the CIA operative who an the rescue. The role is played by Ben Affleck in the movie.
Unfortunately, the book is more autobiographical, using the Iranian escape as scaffold to tell more spy stories. In the end I think Mendez is a better operative than he is a storyteller. I would recommend skipping the book and watching the movie instead.
I should also point out that I don’t write for Wired’s GeekDad anymore because of the book and movie. The story came in to the public eye as an article in Wired: How the CIA Used a Fake Sci-Fi Flick to Rescue Americans From Tehran. The publisher of Wired was apparently unhappy with its cash from the book and the movie. As a result, it wanted additional rights to the content in case it developed into something more. The GeekDad writers didn’t like that grab and left Wired.