Now 78, he's quick to boil when asked about the 1980 mission to rescue 53 U.S. hostages in Iran.

Vaught, then a two-star Army general, was the architect of the daring and hastily planned attempt code-named Eagle Claw.

Vaught says senior Pentagon officials tried to make him the scapegoat when the secret raid failed spectacularly on a mild, moonlit night at a remote rendezvous in central Iran that U.S. military planners had dubbed Desert One.

A veteran of three wars and countless bureaucratic battles, Vaught fought back, threatening to go public with intimate details about the mission.

His superiors backed down.

``I figured those rascals would try and do something like that,'' Vaught said from his home in South Carolina. ``But there aren't many people wearing shoes that know more about this than I do.''

This evening at a Fort Walton Beach conference center, Vaught and other Eagle Claw veterans will gather to recall the mission, which began April 24, 1980, and was aborted in the early hours of April 25 because of equipment problems.

As the rescue force prepared to leave, a large Navy helicopter collided with a fuel-laden Air Force transport plane. The crash ignited an inferno that killed eight U.S. servicemen.

Conversation is sure to flow at the reunion. Not all of it will be polite banter, however. Time helps heal wounds, but nagging questions about Eagle Claw remain.

Should the Marine Corps aviators have pressed ahead even though one of their helicopters had reached the breaking point? Did the secrecy surrounding the mission prevent critical messages from being passed between the air and ground crews? Why wasn't there a full dress rehearsal?

What's not open to debate is the mission's place in history. The name Eagle Claw was chosen to evoke the image of a mighty country reaching out to pull its people to safety.

Instead, the pictures seared into the public's memory were of Iranians poking through the charred and mangled U.S. aircraft left behind.

Jimmy Carter's presidency reeled after Iranian militants overran the U.S. Embassy in Tehran on Nov. 4, 1979, and took the Americans hostage. The nation's inability to bring its people home all but assured his defeat at the polls the next November.

The disaster at Desert One also exposed serious flaws in the Defense Department's special operations capabilities, which had atrophied since the end of the Vietnam War.

In that sense, Eagle Claw was, as Vaught puts it, a ``successful failure.''

The Pentagon leadership was forced to confront the shortcomings, but with the Soviet Union still dominating the strategic landscape, it made only modest adjustments.

In 1986, Congress established U.S. Special Operations Command in Tampa. As counterterrorism and smaller-scale conflicts in developing countries became higher priorities for the U.S. government, the command's stature grew.

Now, with strong backing from Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, SoCom's commando forces are the nation's most potent weapon in the war on terrorism.

The command has a multibillion-dollar budget, more than 50,000 personnel, cutting-edge equipment and unprecedented authority to track down al-Qaida and other terrorist networks.

``Talk about coming in from the cold,'' said James Locher, who served as assistant secretary of defense for special operations and low-intensity conflict from 1989 to 1993.

``Special operations went from being an outcast - neglected, rejected, distrusted - to being the premier, most valuable U.S. military capability,'' said Locher, now a lecturer and lead instructor of the U.S. State Department's combating terrorism program for senior foreign leaders.

Yet the expanded power has generated concern within other government agencies, particularly the State Department. Officials there worry that international protocols could be ignored as U.S. commandos secretly pursue terrorists into a foreign nation. A bungled mission could create a diplomatic crisis, they say.

Chargin' Charlie

If today's special operations capabilities had existed a quarter-century ago, Eagle Claw participants are confident the mission would have succeeded.

``The probability of success would have been infinitely greater today,'' said retired Army Lt. Col. Bucky Burruss, 63, a former deputy commander of Delta Force, the shadowy hostage rescue team sent to free the Americans.

But a quarter-century ago, there was no central organization to train and equip special operations troops. Basic items such as night vision goggles and satellite radios were scarce or not used properly.

There was no shortage of forceful personalities, however. Perhaps the most controversial was ``Chargin' Charlie'' Beckwith, the charismatic Army colonel who formed Delta Force in the late 1970s.

A burly man with a shoot- from-the-hip style, Beckwith was intense, profane, emotional and harder on his superiors than subordinates. He died of natural causes in 1994 at age 65.

``He was a no-nonsense kind of guy,'' said John Carney, 64, a retired Air Force colonel who was part of the rescue mission.

``You had to be from his bolt of cloth,'' added Carney, a Tampa resident. ``He basically ruined his career protecting people and getting Delta Force built.''

In the early 1960s, Beckwith spent a year in an exchange program with the British Special Air Service. He became convinced U.S. special forces were bogged down by outdated doctrine and arcane rules.

So he spent the next 15 years agitating for a more flexible organization - one able to adapt quickly to threats. Beckwith's confrontational style won him more enemies than converts, but he pressed on.

After the Palestine Liberation Organization took Israeli athletes hostage during the 1972 Olympics in Munich, Germany, the Defense Department began to recognize the growing threat of international terrorism but did little beyond preparing concept papers.

Then came Entebbe. In July 1976, Israeli commandos stormed a hijacked Air France jet that had landed in Uganda's capital. Two hostages were killed, but dozens of others were freed.

A year later, a German special forces team assaulted a hijacked Lufthansa airliner on the ground in Mogadishu, Somalia, and rescued all the hostages.

Senior Pentagon officials began asking, ``Can we do that?''

``No,'' was the answer from commanders in the field.

Beckwith was directed to create a counterterrorism team that would specialize in quick-strike, hostage-rescue missions. The hypersecret unit formally was known as 1st Special Forces Operational Detachment-Delta. More simply, it was called Delta Force.

Beckwith spent the next year finding troops with the right physical and mental characteristics.

It wasn't enough to be battle-hardened and a crack shot. Successful candidates also were shrewd and able to keep cool under intense pressure, said Logan Fitch, a former Delta Force squadron commander who was part of the team that went into Iran.

``We wanted a cross between Robert Redford and John Wayne,'' said Fitch, 61, now a financial consultant living outside Houston. ``We were looking for someone who could think for himself.''

On Nov. 3, 1979, Delta Force successfully saved a group of hostages held by terrorists. It was a drill, but the unit performed well. According to Beckwith's 1983 autobiography, ``Delta Force,'' he and his men celebrated into the wee hours Nov. 4.

Shortly after going to sleep, Beckwith was awakened by one of his officers and told that Iranian militants had captured the U.S. Embassy in Tehran. Americans were held hostage.

This was real.

Best-Laid Plans

While the Carter administration was using diplomatic channels to try to free the hostages, the Pentagon was busy considering highly classified military options.

All of them revolved around Delta Force. The quandary: how to get nearly 100 Delta commandos into Iran and then out with the hostages.

Wade Ishimoto, Delta's intelligence officer at the time, laughed as he recalled a few of the initial ideas. One involved Delta Force parachuting into the U.S. Embassy compound to make the rescue.

``We can jump in,'' Ishimoto recalled telling the planners, ``but we sure as hell can't jump out.''

A secret task force headed by Vaught settled on an intricate plan that involved all the service branches.

Six Air Force transport planes loaded with Delta shooters, support troops and fuel would leave the evening of April 24 from Masirah, an island off Oman. The first plane, Dragon One, would depart an hour before the others to make sure the landing area was clear.

At the same time, eight RH- 53D Navy helicopters piloted by Marine aviators would launch from the USS Nimitz, which was sailing off Iran.

All the aircraft would meet at Desert One, a barren patch of salt flat about 260 miles southeast of Tehran. The helicopters would refuel, and the ground forces would climb aboard for a short flight to a hide-out near the city.

Delta would spend the daylight hours of April 25 hidden in an isolated area of hills and caves. After sundown, the commandos would pile into trucks supplied by U.S. spies in Tehran and drive downtown, where they would assault the embassy and free the hostages.

Air Force gunships flying overhead would provide air cover. The Navy helicopters would hover nearby, ready to swoop in and carry everyone to safety.

But Eagle Claw fell apart before it really got started. Ishimoto and other troops on Dragon One were assigned to guard a road that ran along Desert One.

First they stopped a busload of Iranians and detained the passengers. Then a gasoline tanker came barreling through the night.

Ishimoto fired his M-16 into the engine, but it didn't slow down. So he ordered one of his men to hit it with an antitank rocket. The tanker exploded.

``First a bus. Then a truck. What the hell else could go wrong?'' recalled Ishimoto, now 64 and a senior adviser to the Pentagon's special operations director.

John Townsend, an Air Force navigator on the third transport plane, saw flames shooting into the dark sky as his aircraft prepared to land.

``I have kind of a warped sense of humor,'' said Townsend, now 54 and living in Fort Walton Beach. ``The first thought that occurred to me was, `Gee, that just can't be good.' ''

It got worse.

Collision Course

During the flight from the Nimitz, the Marine pilots ran into a massive sandstorm known as a haboob. Flying through the clouds of dust delayed their arrival and left them physically and emotionally exhausted.

Two of the Navy helicopters never made it to Desert One because of mechanical failures. Six did, the minimum needed to carry all the troops and hostages. Once on the ground, however, another chopper failed and the mission was scrubbed.

As the troops got back on the planes for the return flight, Marine Corps Maj. Jim Schaefer taxied his helicopter into position. Visibility was low, and he crashed into one of the fuel-heavy transports.

Randy Gingrich, then an Air Force technical sergeant who was on a nearby plane, recalled the sound.

``It wasn't like a stick of dynamite going off,'' said Gingrich, 61. ``It was a `phooooompf,' a much deeper and lower kind of roar.''

Gingrich, a Navarre resident, earned an Airman's Medal for pulling Schaefer and his co-pilot to safety.

Three Marines and five Air Force personnel perished in the blaze. Others were badly burned, including J.J. Beyers, an Air Force radio operator who was trapped in the transport by the flames. Two Delta Force troopers risked their lives pulling him to safety.

Beyers, who now lives in Niceville, spent months in the hospital undergoing multiple surgeries and skin grafts. Doctors initially thought they would have to amputate his charred fingers.

Despite his injuries, Beyers has no regrets about being part of Eagle Claw and chalks the accident up to ``unforeseen events.''

Like other members of the rescue team, he is convinced the plan would have worked if the helicopters had been on time and in working order.

``There's no doubt in my mind everybody involved in it would have gone again immediately,'' said Beyers, 62.

As Desert One blazed, mission commanders got all the troops on the remaining transports, leaving the wreckage and five Navy helicopters behind. The mood was funereal on the long trip back to Masirah.

``There was in my mind a sense of failure,'' Fitch said. ``Shame, maybe. Proud to have been a part of it but extremely unhappy the way it turned out and, in some cases, the way it was handled.''

Retired Air Force Col. Roland Guidry, one of the lead transport pilots, said the failure stung all the more when the hostages finally were released in January 1981.

After they told their stories about the 444-day ordeal, it was clear their Iranian captors would have been no match for Delta's firepower, he said.

``Had we gotten past the refueling operation, there's no doubt in my mind it would have been a total success,'' said Guidry, now 65 and living in Destin. ``Delta would have had no surprises.''

Carney, the retired Air Force colonel, said Eagle Claw failed ``because the richest nation on earth ended up short one helicopter.''

U.S. commandos now have their own specially tailored helicopters and crews to avoid the problems that plagued Eagle Claw.

New Strategies

Since the Sept. 11 attacks, policy-makers in Washington have further empowered special operations forces.

A new law allows Green Berets and Navy SEALs to dip into a special account to pay informants or hire local militias to help them track down terrorists hiding in Iraq, Afghanistan and elsewhere.

``This is a major step forward for special operations,'' said Thomas O'Connell, the assistant secretary of defense for special operations and low- intensity conflict.

To improve the flow of information to special forces units on the ground, the Defense Department has teamed them with military controlled spies, interpreters and computer experts who can access key databases.

Defense officials also reportedly are pushing a proposal that would allow commandos to enter a foreign nation without first notifying the U.S. ambassador there.

This idea has caused concern at the State Department because it would undercut the ambassador's authority to decide which U.S. personnel enter the country.

O'Connell denied such a plan exists.

However, the military and intelligence communities must have the leeway to go after terrorists who pay little attention to diplomatic protocols, he said.

``In the war on terrorism, CIA and Defense focus on terrorist networks whose activities may be within but often go beyond a country's borders,'' he said. ``State Department ambassadors and chiefs of mission focus on the country where they are assigned.''

The mere discussion of circumventing an ambassador's authority is troublesome, said John Limbert, president of the American Foreign Service Association in Washington.

``This is a thoroughly bad idea,'' said Limbert, a 32-year veteran of the State Department. ``You cannot leave out of your planning and consideration the person on the ground who is the president's personal representative.''

Proponents of more permissive rules might label Limbert too cautious, a bureaucrat primarily interested in protecting the State Department's turf.

But Limbert understands the dangers of terrorism better than most. He was a political officer at the U.S. Embassy in Tehran 25 years ago and was one of the 53 hostages.

He has nothing but respect for the commandos who tried to rescue him and the others.

``They had the guts to try and come and get us,'' he said. ``We were not forgotten.''

Casualties