Smoothing the Way

By Thomas A. Sancton

Medics and debriefers are also waiting anxiously

With its 20 white concrete buildings, 235 beds and 844 staff members, the U.S. Air Force hospital in Wiesbaden, West Germany, is the biggest and best-equipped American military medical facility in Europe. While it is prepared for anything from hangnails to heart surgery, the hospital expects to be confronted soon with an unusually delicate task: receiving and caring for the 52 American hostages during their first critical days of freedom. "Officially, we don't even know they're coming here," says a senior member of the hospital staff. "Unofficially, we've been ready to process and treat these people since last November."

At Rhein-Main air base 25 miles away, two white C-9A Nightingale hospital planes are on 24-hour stand-by to fly to any European or North African destination to pick up the precious passengers. By every means that can be foreseen, from both a medical and psychological point of view, the way is being smoothed for the hostages' arrival. Says a State Department official involved in planning for the hostages' reception: "The first hours, even the first two days, are a very delicate time. They should be free of any pressures. They need to take a deep, long breath."

Preliminary medical examinations will probably be carried out aboard the C-9As en route to Wiesbaden. After arrival at the hospital, those who do not need immediate attention will be given complete physicals, undergoing tests for, as the hospital puts it, "everything from tapeworm to tuberculosis." Extensive psychological testing will also take place.

Finally, the hostages will be debriefed on the details of their ordeal--kindly but thoroughly--by a number of intelligence interrogators. The nature of the debriefing will depend on the individual hostages and the circumstances of their release. If all the hostages are released at once, for example, debriefing will have less urgency. If there is only a partial release, the freed hostages will be quickly questioned to determine the condition and location of the remaining captives. The higher-ranking diplomats among the freed hostages will be expected to make their own full analytic reports about their captivity.

Having consulted with a broad spectrum of medical experts, U.S. officials want to postpone family reunions until after the hostages have gone through a "decompression period." Explains one of the psychologists who helped formulate the plan: "A family reunion, as long sought after as it may be, creates certain burdens. An emotional performance is required that the hostages may need some time to work up to." Some hostage families, however, are reportedly planning to fly to Wiesbaden despite official appeals to hold off. The Wiesbaden stopover is expected to take from three days to a week, depending on the hostages' condition. After that they will be flown to Washington to meet with their families, and only then will they be welcomed with what is sure to be an effusive display of official national honors.

Medical experts expect that some of the hostages could suffer from a variety of psychological disturbances as well as psychosomatic disorders triggered by prolonged stress. Says Dr. David Barry, associate professor of psychiatry at the University of Rochester School of Medicine and Dentistry: "Their anger is mobilized, and they have no way to discharge their feelings. This results in anxiety, long-term repressive feelings and psycho-physiological conditions such as high blood pressure. The hostages will be irritable, jumpy, and display a short fuse." They may also display everything from memory lapses to lost appetite, insomnia and nightmares. While the severity will vary, the psychological scars are sure to be deep in every case. Says David G. Hubbard, a Dallas psychiatrist: "Some individuals are strengthened in a situation like this, and some are crippled."

One of the biggest question marks is to what degree the propaganda of the Iranian militants may have rubbed off on their captives. When Marine Corporal William Gallegos was interviewed by NBC last December he expressed sympathy for the Iranian revolutionaries; this aroused some suspicions that the hostages may have been subjected to brainwashing, perhaps of the sort employed by the North Koreans against American P.O.W.s, as became evident after Operation Big Switch in 1953, when 3,313 U.S. prisoners were returned. Most experts, however, doubt that the Iranian militants have resorted to systematic brainwashing. What has probably happened, at least with some of the hostages, is a degree of identification with their captors--a temporary reaction often referred to as the "Stockholm syndrome."* Says Stanford University's Donald T. Lunde, a psychiatrist who has treated Kidnap Victim Patty Hearst: "I'd expect the hostages to have some quite positive feelings for their captors for the single reason that these people have been playing a parental role with them and kept them in a dependent state." As a result, says Lunde, "they'll be making anti-Shah, anti-CIA statements in the first couple of weeks." Most experts share Lunde's belief that the Stockholm effects will soon wear off.

The speed and facility with which the hostages succeed in re-entering normal life will depend in large part on the tolerance and understanding they receive from their families and from the American public. The unthinking could all too easily confront them with two opposed dangers: either a hostile reaction to possible pro-Iranian utterances or excessive public adulation. Warns Psychology Professor Murray S. Miron of Syracuse University: "The more we lionize the returning hostages, the more inconsistent their attitude could be about themselves." Hubbard agrees that two much notoriety could aggravate their psychological problems. "These folks need privacy and gentleness. It's like coming out of the dark, dark room into bright light"

--By Thomas A. Sancton.

Reported by Lee Griggs/Wiesbaden and Roberto Suro/Washington

* After a 1973 Swedish bank robbery in which hostages sought to protect their captors.

With reporting by Lee Griggs, Roberto Suro

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