The Siege

On 30 April 1980 six Iranian Arabs seized the Iranian Embassy in the center of London and took 26 people hostage.  They demanded the release of prisoners in Iran and safe passage out of the United Kingdom.  British authorities managed to get five hostages released in return for minor concessions, but time passed, and tensions rose.  On the sixth day, the hostage takers killed one of their captives.  This killing triggered the British to launch an assault to rescue the remaining hostages.  The roughly seventeen-minute assault was carried out by the British Army’s Special Air Service.  Since all this took place in the center of London, the six-day siege and assault were viewed by the world.  Ben MacIntyre tells the story in, “The Siege: A Six-Day Hostage Crisis and the Daring Special-Forces Operation That Shocked the World”.