9. The Seizure Happened on November 4, 1979
November 4, 1979, began like any other day in Tehran. The diplomats who worked at the embassy went to work, as usual, not knowing that a group of students was amassing with plans to take over the embassy and turn all the Americans into hostages. The students had gathered initially to demonstrate the anniversary of a bloody riot that had occurred at the University of Tehran and began their march through the streets of Tehran. The diplomats knew that they would pass by the embassy and believed that they would keep moving. What they didn’t expect was that hordes of disaffected students would overwhelm the guards, climb the fences, and storm the embassy.
Ironically, some of the American diplomats were in a meeting with Iran’s Foreign Ministry discussing the need for increased security at the embassy. They were soon alerted that the embassy was under attack and immediately rushed back. What they found was that hundreds of people were now occupying the embassy. Meanwhile, personnel at the embassy immediately began shredding as many classified documents as they could to keep top-secret information from falling into the wrong hands. Even as the attack was unfolding, everyone underestimated what the students were planning to do: take all the diplomats hostage.