Shock, Anger

World reaction is mixed as some support Carter, others fume

"When I heard the news for the first time, I failed to believe it." That was how Soviet Foreign Minister Andrei Gromyko, in Paris on an official visit, reacted to word of the abortive American attempt to rescue the hostages in Tehran.

As reports gradually confirmed details of the U.S. operation, some governments responded with anger, some with sympathy. Syria's state-run Damascus Radio denounced the mission as "an aggressive act of piracy." India's Ministry of External Affairs said that it could not condone "military adventurism of the type inherent in the attempt of the U.S." It complained that the raid had "only tended to complicate the situation further and heighten tensions." The Saudis, among America's closest friends in the Muslim world, are alarmed at the prospect of reckless U.S. intervention in the Persian Gulf region. But Egypt's Anwar Sadat was quick to express concern for Jimmy Carter. Said the Egyptian leader: "It is hard luck, but it should not dishearten the Americans from taking more action to free the hostages." Jerusalem also sent words of sympathy and encouragement. Said Israeli Premier Menachem Begin: "It could happen to anybody. We have to join the sorrow of the President of the U.S. and the American people."

Of particular concern to Washington was how Moscow would react. The Kremlin's answer came swiftly, and reflected the deterioration of U.S.-U.S.S.R. relations in the aftermath of the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan. The attempted rescue, said the official Soviet news agency, TASS, was an "armed provocation against the Islamic Republic of Iran." In the kind of stinging personal attack that was shelved during the heyday of detente, TASS accused Carter of being guided by "purely egoistic and narrow political considerations." Stated the news agency: "This new dangerous venture was undertaken by the President in a vain attempt to show himself to be a strong leader, in order to reverse his declining popularity." The Soviets are especially bitter because Washington finally seems to be winning wide support for its efforts to organize a boycott of this July's Moscow Olympics in retaliation for the invasion and military occupation of Afghanistan.

America's allies were as surprised as everyone else by the news of the mission. As a precaution against leaks, Washington had neither consulted nor advised them in advance. British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher first heard of the action when she switched on the 7 a.m. BBC newscast--and that was nearly two hours before she received a personal message from Carter notifying her of the operation. Heads of other allied states had similar experiences.

Nonetheless, key allies rallied to Carter. According to a Downing Street aide, Thatcher sent the President a note expressing her "admiration for his courage" and telling him that she was "much moved" by his television address, in which he took personal responsibility for the operation. Voicing a sentiment that has been repeated privately by officials in many countries, a Tory backbencher noted that "the world would have applauded President Carter's action had it succeeded." West German Chancellor Helmut Schmidt, no great fan of Carter's, extended his "profound sympathies" and contrasted the conditions surrounding the attempted U.S. raid with the successful West German rescue of hostages who were being held by terrorists at Somalia's Mogadishu airport in 1977. "There we had tremendous luck," said the Chancellor. "Also we had the advantage of obtaining not only the permission of Somalia for action on its soil, but also its support."

But despite the publicly expressed sympathy, the allies privately were extremely upset that the rescue attempt came on the heels of last week's Luxembourg meeting of the Foreign Ministers of the European Community. At that meeting the allies had gone further than ever in backing the U.S. on the hostage issue, and they were supported by Japan. They had bowed to Carter's pressure and agreed to take diplomatic measures and threaten economic sanctions against Iran in order to strengthen Washington's hand in getting the hostages out by peaceful means. The Europeans had been warned that unless they went along with sanctions, Washington might have no choice but to use force. About the last thing the allies expected was for the U.S., so soon after their strong gesture of support, to dispatch a rescue mission. In fact, at midweek, the Administration had indicated that it would extend the deadline after which it would consider military action. Thus, said a West German chancellery official: "This was quite a kick in the backside."

In Luxembourg the Foreign Ministers pronounced the hostage situation "intolerable from a humanitarian and legal point of view" and adopted a two-stage program to bring pressure on Tehran. Stage one, aimed at demonstrating allied solidarity with the U.S., consists of a number of steps of primarily symbolic importance. Among them: 1) a reduction of allied embassy staffs in Tehran that stops just short of severing diplomatic relations; 2) a cutback in the number of Iranian diplomats allowed in allied capitals; 3) a requirement that Iranians obtain visas when traveling to allied countries; 4) a ban on the export to Iran of arms and other defense-related equipment; and 5) a warning to allied businessmen not to sign new contracts to supply Iran with goods or services. Commented a French Foreign Ministry official: "These sanctions are psychological rather than directly economic. But the importance of psychological measures at this point cannot be denied."

If no progress on the hostages is made by May 17, the second stage--direct economic action--is to take effect. Under these measures, the Common Market and Japan would, among other things, refuse to service Iranian aircraft and ships, ban all trade with Iran except for food and medicine, and freeze Iranian assets (which in West Germany alone total some $6 billion). Lord Carrington, the British Foreign Secretary, stressed that the mere transfer of the American hostages from their militant captors to the custody of the Iranian government would not constitute sufficient progress to prevent the second-stage sanctions from taking effect. A West German official explained: "If the Americans tell us that there has been progress, we will wait with the sanctions. If they say that there has not been, we will go ahead. They are the ones who will decide, since we are doing this for them."

Doing it for Washington, in fact, was very much the theme at the Luxembourg meeting. Few if any of the allied officials expect diplomatic or economic sanctions to persuade the unpredictable and often irrational Iranians to give up their prisoners. Said a senior British diplomat: "We don't like sanctions and very much doubt their effectiveness. But we felt that it was our clear duty to support the President." A ranking West German Foreign Ministry official said, "Carter ought to be satisfied with his allies."

These sentiments were expressed before the rescue mission; in the wake of that failed effort, there was a strong feeling that Carter had misled the allies. Said a top Common Market official: "Why does the U.S. count on the Europeans so much when what the Europeans do turns out to be irrelevant?" The allies went to "great trouble" to form a common position in support of Carter, said this official, only to confront what he called "another flipflop" in U.S. policy. Among America's allies the most damaging immediate fallout from the aborted mission was the reinforcement of an already strong conviction: Carter is not up to leading the U.S. and the alliance. A senior Common Market official was despairing: "It's not what we thought Americans would do. It's something you would expect from the Italian army." What is especially worrisome, said a British official, is that "if we were not told about this fiasco, might we not also be kept in the dark about something bigger and more dangerous?"

These concerns, and the question of how to deal with Carter, are certain to dominate discussion this week as the European Community's heads of state meet in Luxembourg. The British are going to recommend an early summit with Carter. What is clear is that there is an urgent need for vastly improved understanding between the U.S. and its allies.

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