This three-session course highlights daring U.S. rescue missions across three conflicts—World War II, Vietnam, and Iran. From battling Imperial Japan to bold helicopter rescues in Vietnam and defying Iran’s hostage crisis, each session reveals the courage and determination behind America’s fight to bring its people home.
Session 1: Slaying Darkness of the Rising Sun
The barbarity imposed by Japan's Imperial Army upon American prisoners of war
guaranteed there would be a day of swift and unsparing retribution. That day came when
intrepid American raiders rescued their comrades from captors who soon paid for
their inhumanity.
Session 2: Downwash of the Jolly Green Giants
They were affectionately nicknamed "Jolly Green Giant" by the pilots and crews in Vietnam whose rescues of Americans behind enemy lines became legendary. So it made perfect sense that the warriors flying such helicopters were ordered to summon their heroism and bring our people home.
Session 3: Defying the Ayatollah
Eight months after Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini returned to Iran in 1979, a mob stormed the US embassy and took Americans hostage. While Iran's religious tyrants tormented the hostages (and by extension their families), two feisty Americans collaborated to teach the Ayatollah about the indomitable spirit of the United States of America.
Subject: history
Fred L. Johnson III is a professor of history at Hope College, where he has been on the faculty since 2000. He has a BA from Bowie State University and an MA and a PhD from Kent State University. Prior to his career in higher education, Johnson served in the United States Marine Corps. His primary field of study is nineteenth-century US history, specifically the Civil War. His other areas of expertise are twentieth-century US history, US military history, and African history.