WI: Iran Does Not Release Hostages in 1981

In 1981, Iran released the American hostages. It had been the defining problem for the Carter administration, and was a personal slap in the face to former President Carter upon the inauguration of his successor in an effort to viscerally embarrass the outgoing administration. To the American public, it also represented a new era to be coming with Ronald Reagan. However, it most importantly removed a major problem for the incoming Reagan administration which the new president would not be forced to deal with. Instead, he could shift focus to the economic issues of the era and the necessary recovery. It was a sort of gift from above that he would not be forced to deal with an ongoing hostage crisis, and the need for it's resolution.

What if the Iranians did not free the American hostages? What if Ronald Reagan had been forced to deal with the hostage crisis?
 
What would be the IRI's stated reason for not releasing the hostages after Reagan's inauguration? Would it be a more mild case of "there's a few more concessions we want first", or a more severe case of "Carter, Reagan, it's all the same Great Satan underneath. The hostages aren't going anywhere."
 
What would be the IRI's stated reason for not releasing the hostages after Reagan's inauguration? Would it be a more mild case of "there's a few more concessions we want first", or a more severe case of "Carter, Reagan, it's all the same Great Satan underneath. The hostages aren't going anywhere."

It could be either. Perhaps Reagan insulted Iran on the campaign trail in such a way that it got back to the Iranians. I'm sure he said such things anyway. It just seems that the Iranians were ignorant of American politics; enough so that they saw Carter as the grand imperialist, and Mr. We-Begin-Bombing-In-Five-Minutes as a surely better alternative. They likely had no idea who Ronald Reagan even was.
 
To my thinking, if Reagan cannot negotiate, he'll send in the Marines. And that is a very uncertain prospect, that could end in disaster. At the same time, the Iranians were getting tired of holding onto the hostages, so negotiation may remain an option. He'll need to do something, because the hostage crisis and the economy are going to drag on his initial approval ratings, and he'll begin to look like another failed Post-Kennedy presidency. He may have criticized Carter, but he'll look a lot like Carter.
 
From reading several books on the Hostage Crisis, including Mark Bowden's Guests of the Ayatollah, the hostages learned from guards that Reagan had been elected. And the guards were afraid. They feared that Reagan would intervene-strongly-if the hostages weren't out by the time he took office. Carter's negotiators played this up, telling the Iranians that a new POTUS would take office on 20 Jan 81, and he would not be in a very good mood if the crisis had not been resolved.

There were several options short of Invasion of Iran, such as a naval blockade, mining Iran's harbors a la Haiphong in 1972, air strikes on Iran's oil infrastructure and electrical power grid, all of which were seriously considered at various times, and all the way until the actual hostage release, the Navy kept two carriers always on the Indian Ocean Station, within strike range of targets along the Iranian coast.
 

Thothian

Banned
Reagan would go full military response. Massive bombing campaign, moving multiple carriers to the gulf to shoot the Iranian air force out of the sky, and the US navy would put the entire Iranian navy on the bottom within the first week. Not to mention Airborne Rangers inserted to rescue the hostages.

And if the hostages are executed, expect area bombing of Tehran. Reagan was determined to show overwhelming force in international dealings to expunge the memory of Vietnam and prove himself to the USSR.
 
Reagan would go full military response. Massive bombing campaign, moving multiple carriers to the gulf to shoot the Iranian air force out of the sky, and the US navy would put the entire Iranian navy on the bottom within the first week. Not to mention Airborne Rangers inserted to rescue the hostages.

And if the hostages are executed, expect area bombing of Tehran. Reagan was determined to show overwhelming force in international dealings to expunge the memory of Vietnam and prove himself to the USSR.

I'm not sure the US could stomach another prolonged military endeavour despite public anger towards the Iran situation. If the hostages are subsequently killed, America is now locked in a war in another war in Asia with a power on the USSRs doorstep having failed to achieve what the previous administration had. That's a big risk/consequence for Reagans administration to deal with. I think diplomacy would continued to be pursued.
 
I was born in 1970. . .the actual joke was what's flat, red, and glows in the dark. . .
Not where I lived, it wasn't.
If it were red it wouldn't be visibly glowing with radioactivity - it would be glowing red.
It's only when it's cooled to black that you can see the ĉerenkov radiation.

Of course, that might be the difference between a 10 y/0 and a physics grad....
 
"Black" because it would be turned into ashes?...

As for keeping the hostages: wasn't Iran calling them spies, etc? They could have proceeded with a (kangoroo) court, that would convict them of whatever charges they wanted. 20 years in prison for all.
 
??? but if you've got enough nuking to cause ĉerenkov radiation, the blood will no longer be red, but black.

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Or in a related/darker WI: Iranians decide to massacre all the hostages to spite Carter?

I don't know if they would, because we'd turn Iran into a parking lot. I think more likely, if they kept the hostages and Reagan went all Grenada, that perhaps they would throw the hostages into harm's way purposefully. But I don't know if they'd just straight up execute them.
 
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