Athena Yu’s Reviews > The Siege: A Six-Day Hostage Crisis and the Daring Special-Forces Operation That Shocked the World > Status Update

"The longer the stand-off continued, the more they came to see the police as a greater threat to their safety than the men holding them at gunpoint. In the artificial isolation of the siege, they got to know their kidnappers, to like them, to sympathize with them."

"It's the hostages at the embassy, Prime Minister," a BBC reporter told her.

"Yes, isn't it terrible?" said Mrs. Thatcher. "The government seems to have lost all control of the situation."

This remark was greeted with stunned silence. Was the prime minister really admitting that her government was already foundering? Then it downed: ... She was referring to the other embassy siege, the one in Tehran.