The Cruel Stalemate Drags On

Threats, warnings and shifting signals on the hostages "

Carter doesn't know how ridiculous he sounds when he threatens us," jeered Iran's tempestuous Ayatullah Ruhollah Khomeini. "The noises he makes are similar to those of a frightened lion, who does three things: he roars in the hope of frightening off his challenger, he makes rude noises because fear causes his muscles to contract, and he sways his tail in hopes of finding a mediator."

It can prove dangerous for anyone confronting a lion to conclude that the animal is frightened. But given the Iranian taste for hyperbolic rhetoric, there was a certain truth in Khomeini's metaphor. Jimmy Carter, frustrated by the failure of his economic pressures to win the release of the 50 American hostages, let it be known that he was seriously considering a naval blockade. Before it comes to that, however, he is formally asking the United Nations Security Council this week to impose some form of economic sanctions on Iran--a step that has been taken only once before, against Rhodesia in 1966. Noting that Tehran has repeatedly ignored U.N. pleas for the hostages' release, Carter declared on nationwide TV: "Iran stands in arrogant defiance of the world community." At stake, said the President, are the "foundations of civilized diplomacy [and] the integrity of international law."

Carter did not disclose just what sanctions the U.S. would request. But aides said they will probably include a partial trade embargo, exempting Iranian imports of food and Pharmaceuticals and exports of oil. Carter had no advance word from Moscow, aides said, whether the Soviets would go along with sanctions or block them with a veto.

Thus, in the seventh week of the cruel stalemate over the hostages, tensions mounted again--in Iran, the U.S. and also in Panama, where the deposed Shah Mohammed Reza Pahlavi took up residence on the Pacific resort island of Contadora. In Panama City, several hundred leftists marched through the streets, spray-painting FUERA EL SHAH (Shah get out) on trees and walls and hurling stones at the U.S. embassy. A squad of 30 helmeted officers mounted on motorcycles charged a ragtag band of 100 marchers, led by part-time Radio Commentator Miguel Bernal. The police and National Guard beat the demonstrators to the ground with 18-in.-long red-and-black rubber truncheons and hauled them off to jail.

In the midst of the uproar, while the Shah calmly set up housekeeping at his new haven, U.S. officials in Washington were trying to determine how his abrupt departure from the U.S. would affect the plight of the hostages. An answer soon came from Tehran, and then another and another. First, in their 74th communique of the crisis, the militants holding the U.S. embassy bluntly declared that "to reveal the treacherous plots of the criminal United States and for its punishment, the hostage spies will be tried." The same hard line was reflected in a banner headline by the newspaper Islamic Republic, which usually serves as the organ for Khomeini's Islamic Republic Party: THE TRIAL OF THE HOSTAGES IS DEFINITE.

Within hours, however, this was denied by Foreign Minister Sadegh Ghotbzadeh, who, since taking office four weeks ago, has apparently been searching for a way out of the impasse. He promised that "no trial will go on," though the government still intended to convene an "international grand jury" to investigate the "Shah's crimes and American foreign policy here." In the meantime, he said, release of some hostages before Christmas was "possible but not certain." Added Ghotbzadeh: "We will try to do our best to defuse the crisis. I certainly don't want to have this crisis forever."

For those statements Ghotbzadeh was promptly summoned to the holy city of Qum for a refresher course on the Ayatullah's policies. Afterward, Khomeini announced that everyone was in accord. Said he of the students' renewed demand that the hostages be tried unless the Shah is sent back to Iran: "The nation agrees with this. The Foreign Minister and the government also agree with this. Why should the nation not support this?"

The Ayatullah insisted that the hostages were not protected by diplomatic immunity because the U.S. embassy was not a proper embassy. Said he: "It was a den of espionage, and they are spies. We reject all the clamor by various sections abroad that these people should be freed because they are embassy staff and members of a mission." Emboldened by the regime's new expressions of support, the student militants turned their fire on Ghotbzadeh. In Communique 75, they accused him of "talking too much." Said the militants: "The Iranian nation should be ashamed to speak more than necessary to an enemy, particularly a filthy one like America." To hasten his fall from grace, the state-run radio, which until three weeks ago was directed by Ghotbzadeh, praised the students' criticism of him and declared: "There is no room for diplomatic games in our revolution." It was clear warning that Ghotbzadeh may face the same fate as his predecessor, Abolhassan Banisadr, who was fired as Foreign Minister after 18 days of service because he seemed too conciliatory about the hostages. For the rest of the week, the normally loquacious Ghotbzadeh made no more public statements. Said a longtime associate: "It is the first time that Ghotbzadeh has not fought back when attacked." Added a Western diplomat in Tehran: "By all appearances, we are back to Square 1."

Experts assessing the balance of forces in Tehran believed Khomeini and his reactionary mullahs were still very much in command of the divided Revolutionary Council. But the situation took a complicating turn when two gunmen assassinated one of Khomeini's close colleagues, Mohammad Mofatteh, dean of Tehran University's College of Theology, and two of Mofatteh's bodyguards. Although an anonymous caller to the state news agency claimed that the killings were committed by a previously unknown terrorist group called P.M., Khomeini and his followers characteristically blamed the assassinations on the U.S. Said the victim's son, Sadegh Mofatteh, 21, a college student: "No matter who pulled the trigger, it was the CIA that engineered the conspiracy."

Using the student militants as a sort of Muslim Red Guard, Khomeini unleashed a campaign to silence critics of his strict theocracy. The students produced documents, purportedly from embassy files, indicating that Ambassador to Sweden Abbas Amir Entezan had advised the U.S. on ways of mending relations with the revolutionary government. One document described him as "actively interested in maintaining contacts with the United States and sincerely trying to mend bilateral relations between Iran and the United States." Summoned to Tehran, supposedly for consultations, Entezam was arrested at the airport on charges of disloyalty. Meanwhile, the Ayatullah Kazem Sharietmadari, Khomeini's chief religious rival, went into seclusion. As a result, his disappointed followers, the Azerbaijanis, who had been demonstrating for two weeks in Tabriz, suspended their protest against the central government.

The regime moved at the same time to bring to heel the 300-member foreign press corps, much of which it has tried to use for propaganda purposes. Some 2,000 Khomeini supporters marched through the streets of Tehran denouncing "Zionist-and imperialist-affiliated journalists" for sending "false and baseless" reports to the West. Following that, the government expelled TIME'S correspondents in Iran, Bruce van Voorst, 47, and Roland Flamini, 45. Abol Ghassam Sadegh, director general for the foreign press in the Ministry of National Guidance, denounced TIME for "one-sided and biased" coverage. Said he: "Since the hostage problem, the magazine has done nothing but help arouse the hatred of the American people toward Iran." One example he cited was TIME'S use on its cover of Khomeini's quote: "America is the great Satan." Sadegh admitted that Khomeini had made the statement but charged that TIME had taken it out of context.

Sadegh announced that the magazine's bureau would be closed indefinitely. Under questioning by a reporter for a Persian-language newspaper, he also said that Van Voorst had worked in the past for the CIA. Van Voorst was in fact a research assistant for the CIA in the mid-1950s but severed all connections with the agency after he became a journalist and made no effort to keep his former CIA affiliation a secret.*

In Washington, the Carter Administration seemed to despair of reconciling the conflicting messages from Tehran about the hostages. Said State Department Spokesman Hodding Carter III: "There are signs that come and signs that go. Interpretation of them is subject to change almost on an hourly basis."

To demonstrate Americans' support for the hostages, Carter asked people across the country to fly U.S. flags on Tuesday, which he designated National Unity Day. The biggest was a 60-ft. by 90-ft. flag that hung on the George Washington Bridge between New York and New Jersey. Americans also mailed the hostages hundreds of thousands of Christmas cards, including one that was 10 ft. by 64 ft. and signed by 22,000 people in Panama City, Fla.

At the same time, the President dispatched a delegation of State and Defense Department officials to sound out Oman, Somalia and Kenya on the possible use of their airfields and ports by U.S. planes and ships. Carter's aides insisted that the talks had nothing to do with the hostage crisis. But almost simultaneously, they disclosed that the President was considering taking "nonviolent" military action against Iran, possibly a naval blockade of the country's ports. This would run the risk of damaging U.S. relations with allies in Europe, who are heavily dependent on Iranian oil, and with Muslim nations that have not taken sides in the dispute. On the other hand, a failure to end the impasse soon might fuel criticism of Carter for focusing too narrowly on the hostages and not paying enough attention to the broader impact of his actions on the U.S. position elsewhere in the region (see WORLD).

Signaling a blockade in advance seemed an odd way to fight a diplomatic conflict, but the Administration hoped that in this war of words, the warning alone might influence Tehran. Said a Carter aide: "You have little to lose by making damn sure they understand." -

*TIME has strongly protested the expulsion. Said Chief of Correspondents Richard L. Duncan in a cable to Sadegh: "TIME will, of course, continue to report fully on events in Iran from the sources available to it. We regret that you have deprived us of the opportunity to ascertain directly for ourselves the true situation in your country. I can think of no occasion when a country has ever improved the quality of the press coverage it receives by expelling correspondents."

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