AP News, December 5th, 2007
TITLE: "One Hour"
LENGTH: 30 seconds.
AIRING: New Hampshire and Boston
SCRIPT: Giuliani: "I remember back to the 1970s and the early 1980s. Iranian mullahs took American hostages and they held the American hostages for 444 days. And they released the American hostages in one hour, and that should tell us a lot about these Islamic terrorists that we're facing. The one hour in which they released them was the one hour in which Ronald Reagan was taking the Oath of Office as president of the United States. The best way you deal with dictators, the best way you deal with tyrants and terrorists, you stand up to them. You don't back down. I'm Rudy Giuliani and I approve this message."
KEY IMAGES: Giuliani speaks to the camera, in suit and tie. Picture of Iranian students holding a blindfolded U.S. hostage. Then a picture of hostages exiting an airplane after their release. The plane's open door bears the words, "Welcome back to freedom."
ANALYSIS: The ad represents a pivot for Giuliani, whose commercials until now have focused on his record as mayor of New York and in comparing his tax policies to those of Democrats. With his new spot, Giuliani is no longer the architect of a New York renaissance, he's now the tough leader ready to emulate President Reagan in confronting terrorists. It's a theme Giuliani can cultivate, given his acclaimed role as the mayor-in-charge during the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks on New York.
The Iranian crisis was a major factor in Carter's defeat in the 1980 election. And Giuliani's ad suggests that Reagan's election alone accounted for the release of the hostages. In fact, it was more complicated than that.
Sixty-six Americans were taken hostage on Nov. 4, 1979, when an Iranian mob attacked the U.S. embassy. The Iranians over time released 14 hostages, leaving 52 in captivity. President Carter froze Iranian assets in the United States, boycotted Iranian oil and worked though diplomatic channels to release the hostages.
In April 1980, Carter ordered a military operation that ended in humiliating failure when three helicopters malfunctioned and a fourth crashed in the staging area in the Iranian desert, killing eight U.S. soldiers. By the end of the year, however, conditions in Iran had changed — Iraq had invaded Iran, Iran had a new government and the country faced an international economic embargo from the U.S. and its allies. Still negotiations dragged on. The hostages were released 444 days after they were captured, on Jan. 20, 1981, leaving Tehran about a half hour after Reagan has been sworn in.
The Giuliani ad seeks to remind voters of those ignominious days and to portray, by association, the current field of Democratic candidates as latter-day Carters and to cloak himself in the mantle of Reagan.
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Analysis by Associated Press Writer Jim Kuhnhenn.
