In Beirut, the enemy is unseen. He is the chaos and instability that rides with the whirlwind of civil war, invasion and political strife.
—WARRANT OFFICER CHARLES ROWE, ROOT SCOOP
August 12, 1983
Hussein al-Musawi, founder of the Islamic Amal terrorist group and now a leader in Hezbollah, had taken Iranian ambassador Mohtashemi’s advice.
A strike against the Marines, if successful, would prove even more extraordinary than an attack on the embassy. The Marines were, after all, a symbol of American might.
For the operation, he brought in Abu Haydar Musawi, who commanded a martyrdom group known as the Husayni Suicide Forces. On October 18—the same day Reagan’s advisors argued in the Situation Room over whether to withdraw the Marines—Abu Haydar Musawi arrived in Beirut. He was joined by twenty members of his suicide squad.
Several trucks arrived the following day, which were parked outside the office of Islamic Amal. At the last minute, the French were added as an additional target, payback for the recent sale of Super Étendard fighters to Iraq. The plan mirrored the one used against the Israelis in Tyre and the American Embassy in Beirut. Technicians loaded two trucks with thousands of pounds of explosives. To magnify the blast, workers added tanks of compressed gas. “The detonators,” as historian David Crist noted, “were connected near the steering wheel for easy access by drivers, enabling them to ignite their cargo even if wounded.”
Accounts vary as to the identity of the driver, who has alternately been identified as either Lebanese Shiite Assi Zeineddine or Iranian national Ismail Ascari, though as Crist wisely notes, the latter seems less likely given Iran’s desire not to leave its fingerprints on the mission. The date selected for the operation proved easier. Al-Musawi needed a day in which the Marines would be relaxed, their guard down. For that, there was only one option.
Sunday.