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We got word that our military observation sites in northeastern Iran were under siege and that we could no longer operate our equipment, which was designed to monitor Soviet test missile launchings across the border. The most disturbing incidents were the capture of American personnel. First, there was the short-lived seizure of our embassy in February 1979. Then 20 Air Force employees were taken by Iranians at one of our intelligence monitoring sites and released after several frightening days. The street mobs sometimes whipped up anti-American feelings to a fever pitch. As quietly as possible, we continued to urge the several thousand Americans remaining in Iran to leave. Before and immediately after the Shah's departure from Iran, we had left open our invitation for him to come to the U.S., but he had decided to stay in Morocco. Now we began to hear that King Hassan wanted him to leave. On March 15, King Hassan requested that we accept the Shah. Primarily because of the intense hatred now built up in Iran among the mobs who controlled the country and the vulnerability of the many Americans still there, I decided that it would be better for the Shah to live elsewhere. I asked Cy Vance to help him find a place to stay.
The Shah settled upon the Bahamas but later complained about the high prices and moved on to Mexico. Despite his great wealth, he seemed obsessed with the belief that people were trying to cheat him. He still wanted to come to the U.S., where he had some enthusiastic advocates. Henry Kissinger called to ask me to let the Shah come to the U.S. David Rockefeller came to visit, apparently to try to induce me to let the Shah come into our country. Rockefeller, Kissinger and my National Security Adviser, Zbigniew Brzezinski, seemed to be adopting this as a joint project.
A vocal group of the Shah's friends approached Vance and Brzezinski repeatedly and on occasion appealed directly to me. They had an ally in Zbig, but could not convince me or Cy. Each time, we explained the potential danger to those Americans still in Iran, emphasizing that the Shah had been living comfortably in Morocco, the Bahamas and now Mexico. Each time, they went away partially mollified, only to return again. Some were merely representing the Shah's interests, while others, like Zbig, thought we must show our strength and loyalty to an old friend even if it meant personal danger to a group of very vulnerable Americans. I adamantly resisted all entreaties. Circumstances had changed since I had offered the Shah a haven; now many Americans would be threatened, and there was no urgent need for the Shah to come here. As I wrote in my diary at the time, "I don't have any feelings that the Shah or we would be better off with him playing tennis several hours a day in California instead of in Acapulco."
Predictably, our embassy people in Iran recommended against our inviting the Shah to the U.S. We had already reduced our Tehran diplomatic staff to fewer than 75, vs. 1,100 before the revolution began. We had also completely revamped the embassy's security features, and were convinced