Gunmen launched an attack on the US Embassy in central Tehran yesterday morning, providing an example of the gun law that many fear is here to stay for some time. Trapped inside the Embassy during the attack were Ambassador William Sullivan, about 100-150 of his staff and two journalists. Although the Embassy sustained damage, only one person, an Iranian waiter, was killed. Four Americans were slightly wounded.
Another example of the gun law came last night when the Tehran radio and television complex came under attack. The radio broadcast an urgent message asking all ╥true revolutionaries╙ to go to the station and help to repel the attack. Thousands of supporters of Ayatollah Khomeini immediately poured into the streets armed with rifles, machine guns, and bazookas, commandeered trucks and drove to the radio station. The attack was repulsed after 45 minutes of heavy shooting.
Gunmen launched a series of hit-and-run attacks on mosques, radio stations and power plants across Tehran in a direct challenge of strength to the country╒s three-day-old Islamic government. The lightning raids were apparently launched by extreme left-wing
elements.
Violence also erupted in the provinces, where more than 200 people were killed in the last two days, when mobs identified as pro-Shah stormed the radio station in the North-west city of Tabriz and occupied it.
Khomeini, battling desperately to preserve his hand-picked Government and his revolution, called for a total end to strikes throughout the country by Saturday, including the country╒s vital oilfields. Political sources said the struggle between Khomeini╒s Government and left-wing elements would be crystallised in the response Khomeini received to his back-to-work order.
In Afghanistan, meanwhile, the US Ambassador was killed after he had been kidnapped yesterday morning by guerrillas.
No statement on the Tehran Embassy incident has come from Ayatollah Khomeini or the Prime Minister of the provisional Government, Mehdi Bazargan. But both must be deeply concerned at their ability to exercise any authority over the thousands of gunmen now roaming the streets of the capital. A further test of Khomeini╒s authority will come on Saturday when he has ordered an end to the strikes that did so much to destroy the power of the Pahlavi dynasty.
The attack on the Embassy started at about 10.15 a.m. when gunmen came over the walls and gates of the compound in several places under supporting fire from rooftop snipers. As they dropped inside the compound they opened up with everything from G3 rifles to machine guns, spraying the main Embassy building and other offices with bullets.
The Embassy╒s US Marine guard returned fire with bird-shot to give officials time to destroy secret documents and coding equipment, but were then ordered by the Ambassador to unload and discard their weapons.
The Embassy staff, about 100 to 150, were taken to the communications room on the first floor while marines filled the ground floor with teargas. But this had only a temporary delaying effect.
Gunmen eventually broke into the Embassy, forcing many of the staff at gunpoint to lie on the floor. Others ransacked the East wing, broke up communications equipment and smashed the main switchboard. They left the Embassy virtually without communications and without electricity or water.
After the shooting died down, the Ambassador made contact with members of Khomeini╒s committee and requested assistance. But it was more than an hour after the attack had started before more gunmen sent by the committee arrived.
Mr Sullivan said later after his release that there were still ╥some╙ Americans unaccounted for who had been driven away earlier by the Khomeini forces of the original attacks.
Revolutionaries said they attacked the Embassy because an agent of the now-
disbanded secret police, SAVAK, had stored secret documents in the compound and were also hiding there themselves.
