Iran-contra affair

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Iran-Contra affair (1985-92), a rare non-venal political scandal in which high officials of the Reagan administration were discovered to have used funds raised by covert arms sales through Israel to Iran in order to finance the activities of the ‘Contra’ revolutionaries against the Sandinista regime in Nicaragua, every step of which violated declared government policy, domestic law, or international law—or all three. Ramifications included fund-raising from friendly Arab states and the employment of British mercenaries for commando raids.

Before ‘mission creep’ asserted itself, it was a modest operation conducted by Reagan's National Security Adviser McFarlane, assisted by Casey, the director of the hamstrung CIA, to prolong the war between Iran and Iraq in order to exhaust both, with the (unfulfilled) hope of obtaining the release of hostages held by pro-Iranian terrorists in Lebanon. But the large amounts of untraceable money this left in Swiss bank accounts proved too tempting to an administration wedded to realpolitik and frustrated by a hostile and highly partisan Congress. The key actors and/or scapegoats were Lt Col North and McFarlane's successor Poindexter. A special investigator obtained convictions against them and six other top officials, all either overturned on appeal or pardoned by Pres Bush.

— Hugh Bicheno

represented the confluence of two politically controversial and arguably illegal foreign policies conducted by the Reagan administration: the arming of Nicaraguan counterrevolutionaries (the Contras) after Congress had banned such aid, and the selling of weapons to the government of Iran in order to secure the release of U.S. citizens held hostage in Lebanon. Both policies became publicly linked following press reports on the Iranian operation in November 1986, when a Justice Department review turned up evidence that millions of dollars in profits from the sale of arms to Iran had been diverted to fund the Contra rebels.

The revelations mushroomed into the greatest U.S. political scandal since Watergate, raising constitutional, legal, and ethical issues concerning the congressional role in foreign policy and the conduct of administration officials. Investigations by a presidentially appointed panel and a joint committee of Congress focused on whether or not President Ronald Reagan knew about or had authorized the diversion—an act that could have constituted an impeachable offense—and whether Congress's constitutional foreign policy and budget prerogatives as well as U.S. laws had been violated. An independent counsel investigated the legality of third‐country fund‐raising for projects banned by Congress, as well as the obstruction of justice by administration officials. Congress ultimately found that the common ingredients of the Iran and Contra policies were “secrecy, deception, and disdain for the law.” And while blaming President Reagan for allowing a “cabal of the zealots” to take charge of foreign policy, it backed away from accusing him directly of illegal acts. The parallel investigation by Independent Counsel Lawrence Walsh secured criminal convictions of nearly a dozen senior administration officials and private citizens for acts such as perjury, conspiracy, fraud, and the destruction of evidence. Walsh's efforts were compromised by congressional grants of immunity to key U.S. officials during several months of televised hearings. All convicted U.S. officials and those awaiting trial, including Secretary of Defense Caspar Weinberger, were pardoned by President George Bush on 24 December 1992 following his defeat for reelection.

The roots of the scandal involving the Contras lay in the Reagan administration's decision in 1981 to conduct covert political and paramilitary operations aimed at “the Cuban presence and Cuban‐Sandinista support structure in Nicaragua and elsewhere in Central America.” Following a series of controversies, including that over the participation of the Central Intelligence Agency in the mining of Nicaragua's harbors in 1983 and 1984, Congress enacted 1984 legislation known as the Boland amendment, which banned any U.S. agency involved in intelligence activities from supporting military and paramilitary operations in Nicaragua.

Notwithstanding the law, President Reagan instructed subordinates to keep the Contras together “body and soul.” Operational control of the Contra program shifted from the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) to the National Security Council. Both prior to and after the passage of the Boland amendment, senior U.S. officials, including the president himself, solicited Contra military aid from private individuals and third countries, including South Africa, Saudi Arabia, Taiwan, and Brunei. National Security Council aide Marine Lt. Col. Oliver North coordinated the resupply operation, which had its own pilots, planes, secure communications, and secret Swiss bank accounts. With the support of his superiors, national security advisers Robert McFarlane and John Poindexter, and, apparently, CIA director William Casey, North directed a network of former military and intelligence officials and businesspeople, code‐named “the Enterprise,” in effect creating a private covert operations capability outside normal channels of oversight and accountability. All the while, the administration insisted publicly that the Contras were in desperate straits due to the congressional cutoff; it also spent federal funds for prohibited propaganda operations aimed at influencing future congressional votes.

U.S. policy toward Iran was developed independently of Nicaragua, but shared many of the same operatives as well as covert practice. After the seizure of the U.S. Embassy in Teheran by Islamic militants in November 1979, the Carter administration had embargoed trade and financial transactions, including arms shipments, to the Iranian regime. The Reagan administration sought to tighten the embargo by enlisting the cooperation of European and other governments, designating Iran as a sponsor of international terrorism.

Despite the public policy of isolation, when U.S. hostages were seized in Lebanon by militants with apparent ties to Iran, the administration undertook covert “arms‐for‐hostage” sales of weapons to the Iranian government in 1985–86. President Reagan did not issue the legally required intelligence “findings” before initiating the covert sales of antitank and antiaircraft missiles, and Congress was not notified of them. The sales also appeared to have violated U.S. arms export laws. The secret arms sales occurred against a backdrop of public statements by President Reagan that the United States would make no deals with terrorists. Although three hostages were released as a result of U.S. efforts, three new ones were taken during the same period.

In the wake of the Iran‐Contra Affair, Congress and President Bush skirmished over reforms to the Intelligence Oversight Act. Bush refused to sign the bill in 1990, although a compromise was enacted in 1991.

[See also Civil‐Military Relations; Iran, U.S. Military Involvement in; Nicaragua, U.S. Military Involvement in.]

Bibliography

• House Select Committee to Investigate Covert Arms Transactions with Iran and Senate Select Committee on Secret Military Assistance to Iran and the Nicaraguan Opposition, Iran‐Contra Affair, 13 November 1987, 100th Cong., 1st Sess., 1987.
• Oliver L. North, Taking the Stand: The Testimony of Lieutenant Colonel Oliver L. North, 1987. Tower Commission Report: The Full Text of the President's Special Review Board, 1987.
• Theodore Draper, A Very Thin Line: The Iran‐Contra Affairs, 1991.
• Cynthia J. Arnson, Crossroads: Congress, the President, and Central America, 1976–1993, 1993.
• Lawrence E. Walsh, Firewall: The Iran‐Contra Conspiracy and Cover‐up, 1997

An American political scandal of 1985-86, in which high-ranking members in the administration of President Ronald Reagan arranged for the covert sale of arms to Iran and diverted the profits to fund the anti-Communist contras in Nicaragua. The weapons were sold to the Iranian government in order to obtain the release of American hostages held in Lebanon by pro-Iranian terrorists. The actions of the administration first became publicly known in November 1986. Investigations by a presidentially appointed panel and a joint committee of Congress focused on whether or not Reagan knew about or had authorized the diversion, and whether Congress's constitutional foreign policy and budget prerogatives as well as U.S. laws had been violated. An independent counsel investigated the legality of third-country fund-raising for projects banned by Congress, as well as the obstruction of justice by administration officials. Congress ultimately found that there had been “secrecy, deception, and disdain for the law, ” but that President Reagan had not broken the law. Nearly a dozen senior administration officials and private citizens were convicted of crimes, but all convicted U.S. officials and those awaiting trial were pardoned in December 1992 by President George H. Bush.

See the Introduction, Abbreviations and Pronunciation for further details.

On 8 July 1985, President Ronald Reagan addressed the American Bar Association and described Iran as part of a "confederation of terrorist states … a new, international version of Murder, Inc." Ironically, that same month, members of the Reagan administration were initiating a clandestine policy through which the federal government helped supply arms to Iran in its war with Iraq, the nation supported by the United States. Millions of dollars in profits from the secret arms sales were laundered through Israel and then routed to Central America in support of rebel forces known as the contras, whose professed aim was to overthrow the duly elected government in Nicaragua. Both Secretary of State George P. Shultz and Secretary of Defense Caspar Weinberger opposed the policy but lost the debate to members of the National Security Council. The Iran-Contra Affair, arguably the crisis that did most to erode public confidence in the Reagan presidency, occupied the nation's attention through much of the next two years.

Reagan's staunch opposition to communism and his commitment to the safety of U.S. citizens throughout the world fostered the crisis. In 1979, a communist Sandinista government assumed power in Nicaragua. Soon after Reagan assumed office in 1981, his administration began to back the contra rebel forces with overt assistance. Congress terminated funding for the contras when evidence of illegal covert actions surfaced and public opinion turned against administration policy. At the same time, the public shared the president's disillusion with events in the Middle East because of the October 1983 bombing of a U.S. marines barracks in Beirut, Lebanon, that killed 241 Americans, and the contemporaneous abduction in Lebanon of several U.S. citizens as hostages. Events in both hemispheres came together in the late summer of 1985. From then until 1986, the United States provided Iran with TOW antitank missiles and parts for ground-launched Hawk antiaircraft missiles. The actions violated both the government's embargo on weapons sales to Iran and its avowed policy of not arming terrorists, because the Iranian government apparently was sponsoring Lebanese Terrorism. The administration's rationale for its actions was the benefits promised for the contras. Private arms dealers, acting with the knowledge and approval of Reagan's National Security Council staff, overcharged Iran for the weapons and channeled the money to the rebels.

During a White House ceremony early in November 1986, reporters asked the president to comment on rumors that the United States had exchanged arms for hostages. He repudiated the stories, then appeared on national television one week later to explain the administration's case, a case grounded in denial of any wrongdoing. "We did not," he declared in his conclusion, "repeat—did not trade weapons or anything else for hostages, nor will we." Just six days later, however, on 19 November, Reagan opened a press conference by announcing that he had based his earlier claims on a false chronology constructed by the National Security Council and the White House staff. He announced formation of the President's Special Review Board, known as the Tower Commission. Headed by former Senator John Tower, the board included former Secretary of State Edmund Muskie and former national security adviser Brent Scowcroft. In late February 1987, the board concluded that the president was guilty of no crime but found that Reagan's lax management allowed subordinates the freedom to shape policy.

Concurrent executive branch and congressional investigations of Iran-Contra proceeded into 1987. As independent counsel, a position created by the Ethics in Government Act of 1978, former federal Judge Lawrence E. Walsh explored allegations of wrongdoing. In May 1987, a joint Senate and House committee hastily convened for what became four months of televised hearings that included 250 hours of open testimony by thirty-two public officials. In its report on 17 November, the committee held President Reagan accountable for his administration's actions because his inattention to detail created an environment in which his subordinates exceeded their authority. In the spring of 1988, former national security adviser Robert C. McFarlane pleaded guilty to withholding information from Congress and later attempted suicide. Criminal indictments were returned against Rear Adm. John M. Poindexter, the president's national security adviser; arms dealers Richard V. Secord and Albert A. Hakim; and Lt. Col. Oliver L. North of the National Security Council staff. The convictions of North and Poindexter were ultimately dismissed because evidence against them was compromised by their congressional testimony. In December 1992, just before leaving office, President George H. W. Bush pardoned six others indicted or convicted in the Iran-Contra Affair, including Weinberger, whose diaries allegedly would have shown that both Reagan and Bush knew of the arms-for-hostages deal. "Ollie" North, viewed by some as an unfairly censured patriot, went on to win the Republican Party's nomination in the 1994 Virginia senatorial election. Although he lost to the Democratic incumbent Chuck Robb, he remained in the public eye as a conservative pundit, columnist, and radio personality.

Bibliography

Busby, Robert. Reagan and the Iran-Contra Affair: The Politics of Presidential Recovery. New York: St. Martin's Press, 1999.

Cannon, Lou. President Reagan: The Role of a Lifetime. New York: Public Affairs, 2000.

Cohen, William S., and George M. Mitchell. Men of Zeal: A Candid Inside Story of the Iran-Contra Hearings. New York: Viking, 1988.

Fried, Amy. Muffled Echoes: Oliver North and the Politics of Public Opinion. New York: Columbia University Press, 1997.

Lynch, Michael. The Spectacle of History: Speech, Text, and Memory at the Iran-Contra Hearings. Durham, N.C.: Duke University Press, 1996.

President's Special Review Board. The Tower Commission Report: The Full Text of the President's Special Review Board. New York: Bantam Books, 1987.

Thelen, David P. Becoming Citizens in the Age of Television: How Americans Challenged the Media and Seized Political Initiative during the Iran-Contra Debate. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1996.

Walsh, Lawrence E. Iran-Contra: The Final Report. New York: Times Books, 1994.

———. Firewall: The Iran-Contra Conspiracy and Cover-Up. New York: Norton, 1997.

U.S. political scandal involving Iran, Israel, and Nicaragua.

There were no official relations between the United States and Iran after the long U.S. embassy hostage crisis during the Iranian revolution from 1979 to 1981. Beginning in 1984, Shiʿite groups in Lebanon began kidnapping U.S. citizens and other Westerners. The hostage crisis involved the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) when William Buckley, station chief in Beirut, was seized in March 1984. Out of concern for the release of Buckley, who could potentially reveal U.S. intelligence information, and in the belief that Iran had influence over the kidnappers, the U.S. administration launched an operation whereby missiles and military spare parts were sent to Iran via Israel. This shipment resulted in the release of one U.S. hostage, but not of Buckley, who was already dead. U.S. officials traveled to Iran to establish contacts, and further arms shipments were made.

At the same time and in a completely unrelated effort, the U.S. administration tried to figure out ways to bypass a congressional prohibition of U.S. assistance to the Contra rebels who were attempting to overthrow the leftist Sandinista government in Nicaragua. Lt. Col. Oliver North of the National Security Council devised a plan in which the proceeds from the Iranian sales would fund the Contras. This policy violated both the U.S. commitment not to negotiate with terrorists and the prohibition on aiding the Contra rebels (the two Boland Amendments).

In late 1986 a Beirut-based magazine reported that there were secret negotiations between U.S. officials and Iranians. This led to investigations in the United States and exposure of the operations. U.S. president Ronald Reagan appointed a special commission under the direction of former senator John Tower to investigate. Later, there was a joint congressional committee formed and a special prosecutor appointed. In the end, only some of those involved (North and the two successive National Security Advisers: Robert McFarlane and John Poindexter) were tried and even fewer convicted of any wrongdoing, but it was a political scandal that compromised U.S. credibility with its allies for having violated its pledge not to negotiate with terrorists, and for having sent arms to Iran and having violated a legal ban on providing assistance to the Contras. The actual involvement of President Reagan and of Vice President George H. W. Bush was never clearly established as far as illegal activities were concerned.

Bibliography

Bill, James A. "The U.S. Overture to Iran, 1985 - 1986: An Analysis." In Neither East nor West: Iran, the Soviet Union, and the United States, edited by Nikki R. Keddie and Mark J. Gasiorowski. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1990.

Woodward, Bob. Veil: The Secret Wars of the CIA, 1981 - 1987. New York: Simon & Schuster, 1987.

— BRYAN DAVES
UPDATED BY OLIVER BENJAMIN HEMMERLE

In October and November of 1986, it was discovered that for several years, agents of the United States government had been running an illegal operation to sell weapons to Iran and funnel the profits to the Contras, a military organization dedicated to overthrowing the leftist government of Nicaragua. In December, 1986, Lawrence E. Walsh was appointed independent counsel by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit. (An independent counsel is a prosecutor appointed by the Court of Appeals at the request of the Attorney General of the United States to investigate suspected crimes by members of the executive branch of government.) During the early phases of the investigation, a cover-up was attempted by the Reagan administration. In the words of Walsh's final report, "following the revelation of [the Iran-Contra] operations in October and November 1986, Reagan Administration officials deliberately deceived the Congress and the public about the level and extent of official knowledge of and support for these operations."

The Iran-Contra investigation lasted from 1986 to 1994. During this period, Walsh charged 14 Reagan Administration officials with criminal acts. He obtained convictions and guilty pleas in 11 cases. Two convictions were overturned on a technicality, and several officials, including Secretary of Defense Caspar Weinberger, were issued pre-trial pardons by President George H. W. Bush during the "lame duck" period following his electoral defeat in 1992. Walsh's investigation concluded that "the sales of arms to Iran contravened United States Government policy and may have violated the Arms Export Control Act," that "the provision and coordination of support to the Contras violated the Boland Amendment ban on aid to military activities in Nicaragua" (passed by Congress in 1984), and that "the Iran operations were carried out with the knowledge of, among others, President Ronald Reagan, Vice President George H. W. Bush, Secretary of State George P. Schultz, Secretary of Defense Caspar W. Weinberg, and Director of Central Intelligence William J. Casey." Walsh did not did not have legal power to bring charges against President Reagan or Vice President George H. Bush, as the Boland Amendment was not a criminal statute containing specific enforcement provisions. Congress did not exercise its power to impeach.

Historical background. In 1979, the Somoza dictatorship in Nicaragua was overthrown by a left-wing revolutionary group calling itself the Sandinistas (after Nicaragua revolutionary leader Augusto Cesár Sandino, 1893–1934). Soon after taking office in 1981, President Ronald Reagan ordered the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) to secretly fund and equip the Contras, mostly former members of the Somoza military who sought the overthrow of the Sandinista government, and who were operating from bases in Honduras and Costa Rica (to the north and south of Nicaragua, respectively). On December 8, 1982, a bill was passed by the U.S. House of Representatives forbidding U.S. covert actions "for the purpose of overthrowing the government of Nicaragua;" some funding for the Contras was still allowed. Some of the Congressional reluctance to give U.S. support to the Contras arose from their unsavory tactics. As General John Galvin, commander of the U.S. Southern Command, testified to Congress, the Contras were directed by the CIA to "[go] after soft [i.e., undefended] targets … not to try to duke it out with the Sandinistas directly." In practice, this meant attacking medical clinics, schools, farmer's cooperatives, and other undefended elements of the civil infrastructure, causing almost exclusively civilian casualties.

In May, 1984, Congress discovered that its 1982 restrictions had been disregarded by the Reagan administration. CIA agents, acting at the behest of National Security Council member Oliver North, had been placing mines in Nicaraguan harbors despite the Congressional ban on such activities. Consequently, Congress cut off all funding for the Contras and passed the Boland Amendment, a statute prohibiting any U.S. agency involved in "intelligence activities" from "supporting, directly or indirectly, military or paramilitary operations in Nicaragua by any nation, group, organization or individual."

The "Enterprise." Direct and indirect support for the Contras continued in spite of the Boland Amendment, coordinated by Oliver North through a complex network he termed the "Enterprise." North's agents solicited money and arms for the Contras from three primary sources: (1) countries dependent on U.S. support, including South Africa, Brunei, Saudi Arabia, South Korea, and Israel; (2) wealthy Americans sympathetic to President Reagan's policies; and (3) weapons sales to Iran. The Reagan administration was secretly selling arms to Iran (in probable violation of the Arms Export Control Act of 1976, according to independent counsel Walsh); North's organization diverted money from these sales to the Contras. The Contras also raised money by allegedly selling large quantities of crack cocaine in the United States with CIA complicity. All these activities violated the Boland Amendment's ban on aid to military activities in Nicaragua, as well as other laws.

Administration support of the Contras became public knowledge when a Contra military supply plane was shot down over Nicaragua on October 5, 1986. An American crew member, Eugene Hasenfus, was taken prisoner and revealed that he was a CIA agent. A month later, a Lebanese newspaper exposed the Reagan administration's secret sales of arms to Iran. On November 25, 1986, Justice Department officials went public with the information that these two news items were linked: proceeds from the Iranian arms sales has been diverted to the Contras.

At this stage, what independent counsel Walsh characterized in his official report as "a new round of illegality" began: "Senior Reagan administration officials engaged in a concerted effort to deceive Congress and the public about their knowledge of and support for the operations."

Outcome of the investigation. Fourteen officials were charged with criminal violations as a result of the Iran-Contra investigation. All individuals tried were convicted; one CIA official's case was dismissed because the government refused to declassify information needed for his defense; and two convictions were overturned on technicalities. A few of the most prominent persons charged, as described in the final report of the independent counsel, are listed below

(1) Elliott Abrams (Assistant Secretary of State for Inter-American Affairs): plead guilty to withholding information from Congress.

(2) Robert C. McFarlane (National Security Advisor): plead guilty to four counts of withholding information from Congress.

(3) Oliver L. North (Lieutenant Colonel, U.S. Marine Corps and Assistant Deputy Director for Political-Military Affairs of the National Security Council, 1981–1986): convicted of altering and destroying documents, accepting an illegal gratuity, and aiding and abetting in the obstruction of Congress.

(4) John M. Poindexter (National Security Advisor): convicted of conspiracy, false statements, falsification, destruction and removal of records, and obstruction of Congress. Poindexter's conviction on all counts was overturned on appeal on the grounds that although he lied to Congress, he did so while speaking under a guarantee of immunity. Independent counsel Walsh noted in his final report that North's and Poindexter's convictions were "reversed on appeal on constitutional grounds that in no way cast doubt on the factual guilt of the men convicted."

(5) Secretary of Defense Caspar W. Weinberger was charged with four counts of false statements and perjury. He was pardoned before trial by President George H. W. Bush, who also pardoned Elliot Abrams, Robert McFarlane, and two other men at the same time.

Aftermath. The Iran-Contra affair, like the CIA-organized invasion of the Bay of Pigs in Cuba in 1961, struck a global blow to American credibility. Officials at the highest level had been detected organizing international terrorism (i.e., the Contras), violating U.S. law, and lying under oath. However, like that of the Bay of Pigs before it, the long-term impact of the Iran-Contra affair on U.S. politics and foreign policy was slight, and the central figures in the controversy later enjoyed high-profile careers in both the public and private sectors.

Further Reading

Books

Busby, Robert. Reagan and the Iran-Contra Affair. Chippenham, Wiltshire, Great Britain: Macmillan, 1999.

Marshall, Jonathan, Peter Scott, and Jane Hunter. The Iran-Contra Connection. Boston: South End Press, 1987.

Electronic

Walsh, Lawrence E. "Final Report of the Independent Counsel for Iran-Contra Matters: Volume I: Investigations and Prosecutions." United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia, Division for the Purpose of Appointing Independent Counsel. August 4, 1993. <http://www.fas.org/irp/offdocs/walsh/> (December 10, 2002).

Webb, Gary. "Dark Alliance: The CIA, the Contras, and the Crack Cocaine Explosion." 2002. Originally published in San Jose Mercury News, 1996. <http://home.attbi.com/~gary.webb/wsb/html/view.cgi-home.html-.html> (December 10, 2002).

— LARRY GILMAN

The Iran-Contra Affair involved a secret foreign policy operation directed by White House officials in the National Security Council (NSC) under President Ronald Reagan. The operation had two goals: first, to sell arms to Iran in the hope of winning the release of U.S. hostages in Lebanon, and second, to illegally divert profits from these sales to the Contra rebels fighting to overthrow the Sandinista government of Nicaragua. Discovery of the secret operation in 1986 triggered a legal and political uproar that rocked the Reagan administration. The numerous related investigations and indictments did not end until 1993 and even then questions remained about the roles of senior White House officials in this arms-for-hostages deal.

The affair came to public attention on November 3, 1986, when a Lebanese publication, Al-Shiraa, first reported that the United States had sold arms to Iran. The news was shocking because the Reagan administration had previously denounced Iran as a supporter of international terrorism. Shortly after the Al-Shiraa report Nicaraguan forces downed a U.S. plane and captured its pilot. The pilot's confession led to a second startling revelation: a private U.S. enterprise was supplying arms to Contra rebels.

The enterprise seemed designed to circumvent the will of Congress. In the early 1980s, after bitter debate, Congress had passed legislation barring the use of federal monies to overthrow the Nicaraguan government. Through a series of amendments to appropriations bills enacted between 1982 and 1986, known as the Boland amendments, this legislation blocked the Reagan administration's wish to go on supporting the Contras. Now it had been revealed that private citizens and private monies were being used to this end. Moreover, the operation was being directed from within the White House by the NSC — the president's advisory cabinet on security affairs and covert operations. Directing the Iran-Contra enterprise were Vice Admiral John Poindexter, national security assistant, and his subordinate, Lieutenant Colonel Oliver North, deputy director for political-military affairs.

Each branch of government quickly began a separate investigation into the affair. In December 1986 President Reagan issued an executive order creating the Tower Commission, named after its chair, John Tower. The purpose of this three-member review board was to recommend changes in executive policy regarding the future roles and procedures of the NSC staff. Reagan's creation of the commission was a tacit disavowal of presidential knowledge or responsibility for the actions of Iran-Contra participants. Although admitting that his administration had negotiated secretly with Iran in order to free the hostages in Lebanon, he publicly denied knowing about the arms-supplying enterprise directed by his own NSC staff.

Simultaneously the Senate and the House of Representatives each created a select Iran-Contra committee. These committees were charged with holding hearings to uncover facts and to recommend legislative action to prevent future illegal foreign policy operations. In their zeal to fully expose the affair, the committees granted limited forms of immunity to several key witnesses. This decision proved to be a mixed blessing. On the one hand, it provided Congress and the U.S. public with a wider understanding of the affair through televised hearings (which also made a public favorite out of Lieutenant Colonel North). But it ultimately proved harmful to efforts to prosecute North and Vice Admiral Poindexter.

The attorney general requested that an independent counsel be appointed to investigate wrongdoing. An independent counsel is a special appointee who is given the authority to bring indictments and pursue convictions. For this important role, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit, Independent Counsel Division, selected Lawrence E. Walsh, a former American Bar Association president and former federal judge. Legal authority for Walsh's appointment existed in provisions of the Ethics in Government Act (Pub. L. No. 95-521 [Oct. 26, 1978], 92 Stat. 1824 [28 U.S.C.A. § 592(c) (1) (1982)]).

The various Iran-Contra investigations soon found a plethora of legal violations. The covert arms sales to Iran violated numerous statutes that restricted the transfer of arms to nations that support international terrorism, principally the Arms Export Control Act of 1976 (Pub. L. No. 90-629, 89 Stat. 1320 [22 U.S.C.A. §§ 2751-2796c (1989 Supp.)]). By failing to report the Iranian sales to Congress, the Reagan administration had ignored reporting provisions in the 1980 Intelligence Oversight Act (Pub. L. No. 96-450, tit. IV, 407(b) (1), 94 Stat. 1981 [50 U.S.C.A. § 413 (1982)]). That law required the president to notify Congress in a timely fashion of any "significant anticipated intelligence activity, and to make a formal written "finding" (declaration) that each covert operation was important to national security. Three findings were at issue in the Iran-Contra affair: (1) Not only had President Reagan failed to report the first arms sales, but he had also authorized them through Israeli intermediaries by "oral" findings that were not authorized by intelligence oversight statutes. (2) The Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) justified a second shipment of arms to the Iranians through a "retroactive" finding issued by the CIA's general counsel; Poindexter admitted destroying this finding. (3) President Reagan admitted signing a third written finding, in January 1986, but later claimed he had never read it.

The investigations took two turns. Congress and the Tower Commission completed their hearings and issued reports and independent counsel Walsh pursued wide-ranging indictments against several Reagan administration officials and others. In 1987, Congress issued the 690-page Report of the Congressional Committees Investigating the Iran-Contra Affair (S. Rep. No. 216, H.R. Rep. No. 433, 100th Cong., 1st Sess. 423). The report charged the president with failing to execute his constitutional duty to uphold the law. However, its conclusion did not support changes in legislation to prevent a future breakdown of legality in foreign policy affairs. Iran-Contra, the report said, reflected a failure of people rather than of laws. This assertion pointed to a central political disagreement about the affair: although Democrats were harsh in their condemnation, Republican members of Congress tended to view the investigation itself as an effort by Democrats to interfere with a Republican president's foreign policy. In like fashion, the 1987 Tower Commission report downplayed any need for legislation to revise national security decision making. Instead, it criticized Reagan's lax management style.

After the reports, attention shifted to the independent counsel's investigation. In March 1988, grand jury indictments were brought against North, Poindexter, Richard V. Secord, and Albert Hakim. The indictments included four distinct charges: conspiring to obstruct the U.S. government; diverting public funds from arms sales to Iran to aid the Contras in Nicaragua; stealing public funds for private ends; and lying to Congress and other government officials. With the exception of the routine criminal charge of theft, the most serious points in the indictments essentially accused the defendants of conducting a private foreign policy in violation of constitutional norms.

Before independent counsel Walsh could begin his prosecutions, several pretrial delays took place. First, the law providing for an independent counsel was challenged. The Reagan administration, joining a number of its former officials who were subject to other independent counsel investigations, argued that the law unconstitutionally denied the president important executive power. In June 1988, the U.S. Supreme Court rejected this argument and upheld the law's constitutionality in Morrison v. Olson, 487 U.S. 654, 108 S. Ct. 2597, 101 L. Ed. 2d 569. Next, the first four Iran-Contra defendants — Poindexter, North, Secord, and Hakim— moved for dismissal of the charges brought by Walsh. They argued that their compelled testimony before the joint congressional committees had violated their Fifth Amendment rights against self-incrimination. In United States v. Poindexter, 698 F. Supp. 300 (D.D.C. 1988), U.S. district judge Gerhard Gesell denied the motion, clearing the way for the trials to begin. But the defendants' argument was later to have serious repercussions.

Soon, a more serious obstacle hampered Walsh's prosecution: the Justice Department and the White House refused to release classified information crucial to the case on the grounds that it was vital to national security. Without this information, much of Walsh's case collapsed. He was forced to dismiss the broader charges of conspiracy and diversion — the crux of the Iran-Contra Affair's illegality — and to pursue instead the less serious charges remaining in the indictments.

Walsh won a conviction against Lieutenant Colonel North on May 4, 1989, for obstructing Congress, destroying documents, and accepting an illegal gratuity (United States v. North, 713 F. Supp. 1448 [D.D.C.]). The trial disclosed evidence that suggested that both presidents Reagan and Bush had greater roles in the Iran-Contra Affair than either the Tower Commission or the congressional committees had concluded. During the trial, North's attorneys failed in an attempt to subpoena Reagan, whom North would later squarely blame for complete knowledge of the affair, in his memoir Under Fire: An American Story. Subsequent to the conviction, Judge Gesell denied two motions for an acquittal and a mistrial. Gesell sentenced North to two years' probation, twelve hundred hours of community service, and a $150,000 fine.

North appealed. On July 20, 1990, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia suspended all three of North's felony convictions and completely overturned his conviction for destroying classified documents. At issue was North's earlier testimony before Congress. The appellate ruling was based on the same reasoning as the contention made by North, Poindexter, Secord, and Hakim before their trials: Congress's decision to grant immunity to North had clashed with the Fifth Amendment protection of witnesses against self-incrimination. The appeals court directed the trial court to reexamine North's earlier testimony. Some critics argued that the appellate ruling, written by Judge Laurence Silberman, smacked of partisanship; Silberman had been, in 1980, cochair of the Reagan-Bush foreign policy advisory group. Walsh pressed on, but on September 16, 1991, Judge Gesell dropped all charges against North (North, 920 F. 2d 940 [D.C. Cir. 1990], cert. denied, 500 U.S. 941, 111 S. Ct. 2235, 114 L. Ed. 2d 477 [1991]).

Vice Admiral Poindexter's trial was similar to North's. After failing to win release of classified subpoenaed materials, Walsh narrowed his case to charges that Poindexter had provided false information and made false statements to Congress. Unlike North's attorneys, however, Poindexter's successfully subpoenaed former president Reagan, who became the first former president ordered to testify in a criminal trial regarding the conduct of affairs during his administration. Reagan provided an eight-hour videotaped deposition. However, Poindexter failed to win access to the former president's diaries, which his attorneys argued were crucial to Poindexter's defense.

Walsh's prosecution of Poindexter succeeded through a preponderance of evidence. In testimony for the prosecution, Lieutenant Colonel North said that he had seen Poindexter destroy a high-level secret document, signed by the president, that described the Iran arms sales as an exchange-for-hostages deal. North also described lying to members of Congress at Poindexter's direction. Other testimony revealed that Poindexter had erased some five thousand computer files after the Iran-Contra story broke in the media in November 1986.

On April 7, 1990, jurors convicted Poindexter on all five of the counts in the indictment. Sentenced on June 11, 1990, to six months in prison, he became the first Iran-Contra defendant to receive a prison term, but remained free pending his appeal. Here, as in North, the conviction was overturned. The Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia ruled that Poindexter's testimony before Congress had been unfairly used against him in his trial (Poindexter, 951 F. 2d 369 [D.C. Cir. 1991]).

If the reversal of convictions against Poindexter and North represented a defeat to Walsh, so did several plea bargains that his office secured in the late 1980s. Critics had expected more serious convictions to result from his intense investigation. In March 1988, former national security adviser Robert McFarlane pleaded guilty to four misdemeanor counts of withholding information from Congress and was fined a modest amount. Two private fund-raisers, Carl Channell and Richard Miller, pleaded guilty to using a tax-exempt organization to raise money to purchase arms for the Contras. Channell was sentenced to probation only; Miller was ordered to do minimal public service. In November 1989, Secord, Hakim, and a corporation owned by Hakim all pleaded guilty to relatively minor counts. As Walsh's office persevered, it could show little in terms of prosecutions, and Republicans in Congress derided the multimillion-dollar investigation as a vindictive exercise in partisan politics.

Then, in 1992, Walsh brought an indictment against the highest-ranking Reagan administration official to be charged in the Iran-Contra Affair: Caspar W. Weinberger, former defense secretary. Weinberger was indicted on June 16, 1992, on five felony counts: one count of obstructing the congressional committees' investigations; two counts of making false statements to investigators working for Walsh and Congress; and two counts of perjury related to his congressional testimony. Penalties for each count were a maximum of five years in prison and up to $250,000 in fines.

Walsh based the case on evidence gathered from notes that Weinberger had written while serving for six years in the Reagan administration. These nearly illegible notes, scrawled on seventeen hundred small scraps of paper, formed a personal diary. Weinberger had given them to the Library of Congress, with the requirement that no one could read them without his personal consent. Throughout Iran-Contra investigations, Weinberger had repeatedly testified to Congress and the Tower Commission that he had argued against the arms-for-hostages scheme when it was discussed by White House officials. Walsh did not make Weinberger's involvement an issue in the 1992 indictment. Instead, he zeroed in on Weinberger's testimony under oath that he had not kept notes or a personal diary during the arms sale period. The discovery of the notes in the Library of Congress suggested that Weinberger had presented false testimony.

On June 19, 1992, Weinberger pleaded not guilty to all five felony charges. Judge Thomas F. Hogan set a tentative trial date of November 2, 1992, one day before the presidential election. This timing raised the question of whether Weinberger's trial would cause political embarrassment for President George Bush, who was campaigning against Bill Clinton. Four days before the election, Walsh announced a new indictment against Weinberger. It centered on a note that had been written by Weinberger about a 1986 White House meeting and that seemed to contradict Bush's claim that as vice president he had not been involved in the arms-for-hostages decision making. Senate Republicans, angered by the indictment, asked the Justice Department to name an independent counsel to investigate whether the Clinton campaign had been behind the indictment. Attorney General William P. Barr denied the request.

The case progressed no further. In a surprise reprieve on Christmas Eve, 1992, President Bush pardoned Weinberger and five others implicated in the Iran-Contra Affair. The pardon cited Weinberger's record of public and military service, his recent ill health, and a desire to put Iran-Contra to rest. Bush also pardoned former assistant secretary of state Elliot Abrams; former CIA officials Clair George, Duane Clarridge, and Alan Fiers; and former national security adviser McFarlane. Bush deemed all six men patriots and said their prosecution represented not law enforcement but the "criminalization of policy differences," essentially repeating his long-standing argument that Iran-Contra was really a case where Democrats had pursued a political witch-hunt to punish Republican officials over disagreements on foreign policy (Grant of Exec. Clemency, Proclamation No. 6518, 57 Fed. Reg. 62,145).

Reaction to the pardons divided along party lines, with Republicans hailing Bush and Democrats criticizing him. Walsh accused Bush of furthering a cover-up and thwarting judicial process. He had long maintained that top Reagan administration officials had engaged in a cover-up to protect their president. Now, he promised, Bush would become the subject of his remaining investigation.

Bush's only testimony had taken place in a January 1988 videotaped deposition. An unsettled question was why Bush's personal diaries were withheld from prosecutors for six years; their existence was only disclosed to the independent counsel's office following the 1992 presidential election. Throughout 1993, Walsh sought to interview the former president but was blocked by Bush's attorneys. Bush consistently insisted on placing limits on any interview. Walsh refused those limits, complained that Bush was stalling the investigation, and ultimately abandoned the attempt to question Bush.

Walsh also chose in 1993 not to indict another high-ranking Reagan administration official, former attorney general Edwin Meese III. In 1986, Meese said that Reagan did not know about the arms sales to Iran. Walsh contended that the statement was false, but admitted that building a criminal case against Meese would have been difficult: too much time had passed and could therefore have bolstered memory loss as a defense.

On August 6, 1992, after six-and-a-half years and $35.7 million, Walsh concluded the Iran- Contra investigation and submitted his final report to the special court that had appointed him. The court may decide to make the report's contents public but is not required to do so. Portions of the report leaked to the press have indicated that it accused aides to former president Bush of concealing evidence, but its overall conclusions remain secret.

By 1993, the Iran-Contra Affair seemed over, in one sense. The statute of limitations on crimes that may have been committed during it had expired, and no further prosecution would be forthcoming. However, additional revelations followed as historians sifted through emerging evidence, notably in the memoirs of key participants. The lessons of the affair continued to be debated. Some said that Iran-Contra exposed a pattern of zealous disregard, by the executive branch, of legislative constraint on foreign policy, that dated back to the Vietnam War. Others took the view held by the Reagan and Bush administrations: namely, that nothing terrible had happened.

A scandal in the administration of President Ronald Reagan, which came to light when it was revealed that in the mid-1980s the United States secretly arranged arms sales to Iran in return for promises of Iranian assistance in securing the release of Americans held hostage in Lebanon. Proceeds from the arms sales then were covertly and illegally funneled to the Contras, rebels fighting the Marxist Sandinista government in Nicaragua.

The Iran–Contra affair (Persian: ماجرای مک‌فارلین, Spanish: caso Irán-contras) was a political scandal in the United States which came to light in November 1986, during the Reagan administration, in which senior US figures agreed to facilitate the sale of arms to Iran, the subject of an arms embargo, to secure the release of hostages and to fund Nicaraguan contras.

It began as an operation to improve U.S.-Iranian relations, where Israel would ship weapons to a relatively moderate, politically influential group of Iranians; the U.S. would then resupply Israel and receive the Israeli payment. The Iranian recipients promised to do everything in their power to achieve the release of six U.S. hostages, who were being held by the Lebanese Shia Islamist group Hezbollah, who were unknowingly connected to the Army of the Guardians of the Islamic Revolution. The plan eventually deteriorated into an arms-for-hostages scheme, in which members of the executive branch sold weapons to Iran in exchange for the release of the American hostages.^[1][2] Large modifications to the plan were devised by Lieutenant Colonel Oliver North of the National Security Council in late 1985, in which a portion of the proceeds from the weapon sales was diverted to fund anti-Sandinista and anti-communist rebels, or Contras, in Nicaragua.^[3] While President Ronald Reagan was a supporter of the Contra cause,^[4] no evidence has been found showing that he authorized this plan.^[1][2][5]

After the weapon sales were revealed in November 1986, Reagan appeared on national television and stated that the weapons transfers had indeed occurred, but that the United States did not trade arms for hostages.^[6] The investigation was compounded when large volumes of documents relating to the scandal were destroyed or withheld from investigators by Reagan administration officials.^[7] On March 4, 1987, Reagan returned to the airwaves in a nationally televised address, taking full responsibility for any actions that he was unaware of, and admitting that "what began as a strategic opening to Iran deteriorated, in its implementation, into trading arms for hostages."^[8]

Several investigations ensued, including those by the United States Congress and the three-man, Reagan-appointed Tower Commission. Neither found any evidence that President Reagan himself knew of the extent of the multiple programs.^[1][2][5] In the end, fourteen administration officials were charged with crimes, and eleven convicted, including then-Secretary of Defense Caspar Weinberger.^[9] They were all pardoned in the final days of the George H. W. Bush presidency; Bush had been vice-president at the time of the affair.^[10]

Contents 1 The affair 1.1 Hostage taking 1.2 Arms transactions 1.2.1 First arms sale 1.2.2 Arrow Air 1285 crash 1.2.3 Modifications in plans 1.2.4 Subsequent dealings 2 Discovery and scandal 3 Tower Commission 4 Aftermath 4.1 Convictions, pardons, and reinstatements 5 See also 6 Footnotes 7 References 8 External links

The affair

The affair was composed of arms sales to Iran, and funding of Contra militants in Nicaragua. Direct funding of the Nicaraguan rebels had been made illegal through the Boland Amendment^[5] the name given to three U.S. legislative amendments between 1982 and 1984, all aimed at limiting US government assistance to the rebel Contras in Nicaragua. The affair emerged when a Lebanese newspaper reported that the U.S. sold arms to Iran through Israel in exchange for the release of hostages by Hezbollah.^[11] Letters sent by Oliver North to John Poindexter support this.^[12] The Israeli ambassador to the U.S. has said that the reason weapons were eventually sold directly to Iran was to establish links with elements of the military in the country.

Hostage taking

At the end of the Iran hostage crisis, Vice President George H. W. Bush and other VIPs wait to welcome hostages home

Further information: Lebanon hostage crisis

In the late 1970s and early 1980s, the Middle East was faced with frequent hostage-taking incidents by hostile organizations. In 1979, Iranian students took hostage 52 employees of the United States embassy in Iran. On January 20, 1981, the day Ronald Reagan became President, the hostages were freed following the Algiers Accords. Hostage taking continued following the imprisonment of members of Al-Dawa, an exiled Iraqi political party turned militant organization, for their part in a series of truck bombs in Kuwait in 1983. Hezbollah, an ally of Al-Dawa, took 30 Western hostages between 1982 and 1992, many of whom were American.^[13]

Arms transactions

Michael Ledeen, a consultant of National Security Adviser Robert McFarlane, requested assistance from Israeli Prime Minister Shimon Peres for help in the sale of arms to Iran.^[14] At the time, Iran was in the midst of the Iran–Iraq War and could find few Western nations willing to supply it with weapons.^[15] The idea behind the plan was for Israel to ship weapons through an intermediary (identified as Manucher Ghorbanifar)^[1] to a moderate, politically influential Iranian group opposed to the Ayatollah Khomeni;^[16] after the transaction, the U.S. would reimburse Israel with the same weapons, while receiving monetary benefits. The Israeli government required that the sale of arms meet high level approval from the United States government, and when Robert McFarlane convinced them that the U.S. government approved the sale, Israel obliged by agreeing to sell the arms.^[14]

In 1985, President Reagan entered Bethesda Naval Hospital for colon cancer surgery. While the President was recovering in the hospital, McFarlane met with him and told him that Representatives from Israel had contacted the National Security Agency to pass on confidential information from what Reagan later described as "moderate" Iranians opposed to the Ayatollah.^[16] According to Reagan, these Iranians sought to establish a quiet relationship with the United States, before establishing formal relationships upon the death of the Ayatollah.^[16] In Reagan's account, McFarlane told Reagan that the Iranians, to demonstrate their seriousness, offered to persuade the Hezbollah terrorists to release the seven U.S. hostages.^[17] McFarlane met with the Israeli intermediaries;^[18] Reagan claims that he allowed this because he believed that establishing relations with a strategically located country, and preventing the Soviet Union from doing the same, was a beneficial move.^[16] Although Reagan claims that the arms sales were to a "moderate" faction of Iranians, the Walsh Iran/Contra Report states that the arms sales were "to Iran" itself,^[19] which was under the control of the Ayatollah.

Following the Israeli-U.S. meeting, Israel requested permission from the U.S. to sell a small number of TOW antitank missiles (Tube-launched, Optically-tracked, Wire-guided) to the moderate Iranians,^[17] saying that it would demonstrate that the group actually had high-level connections to the U.S. government.^[17] Reagan initially rejected the plan, until Israel sent information to the U.S. showing that the moderate Iranians were opposed to terrorism and had fought against it.^[20] Now having a reason to trust the moderates, Reagan approved the transaction, which was meant to be between Israel and the moderates in Iran, with the U.S. reimbursing Israel.^[17] In his 1990 autobiography An American Life, Reagan states that he was deeply committed to securing the release of the hostages; it was this compassion that motivated his support for the arms initiatives.^[1] The president requested that the moderate Iranians do everything in their capability to free the hostages held by Hezbollah.^[21]

A BGM-71 TOW anti-tank guided missile

According to The New York Times, the United States supplied the following arms to Iran:^[22]

• August 20, 1985. 96 TOW anti-tank missiles
• September 14, 1985. 408 more TOWs
• November 24, 1985. 18 Hawk anti-aircraft missiles
• February 17, 1986. 500 TOWs
• February 27, 1986. 500 TOWs
• May 24, 1986. 508 TOWs, 240 Hawk spare parts
• August 4, 1986. More Hawk spares
• October 28, 1986. 500 TOWs

First arms sale

In July 1985, Israel sent American-made BGM-71 TOW antitank missiles to Iran through an arms dealer named Manucher Ghorbanifar, a friend of Iran's Prime Minister, Mir-Hossein Mousavi. Hours after receiving the weapons, the Islamic fundamentalist group Islamic Jihad, that later evolved into Hezbollah, released one hostage they had been holding in Lebanon, the Reverend Benjamin Weir.^[14]

Arrow Air 1285 crash

Main article: Arrow Air Flight 1285

After a botched delivery of Hawk missiles, and a failed London meeting between McFarlane and Manucher Ghorbanifar, Arrow Air Flight 1285, a plane containing nearly 250 American servicemen, crashed in Newfoundland on December 12, 1985. On the day of the crash, responsibility was claimed by the Islamic Jihad Organization, a wing of Hezbollah that had taken credit for the kidnapping of the very Americans in Lebanon whom the Reagan administration sought to have released.^[23] The crash came on the fourth anniversary of another attack for which Islamic Jihad took credit: the near-simultaneous bombings of six targets in Kuwait, the French and American Embassies among them. Members of Hezbollah had participated in, and were jailed for, those attacks, but most of the conspirators were members of al-Dawa. The accident was investigated by the Canadian Aviation Safety Board (CASB), and was determined to have been caused by the aircraft's unexpectedly high drag and reduced lift condition, which was most likely due to ice contamination,^[24] although a minority report stated as part of its conclusions that "Fire broke out on board while the aircraft was in flight, possibly due to a detonation in a cargo compartment".^[25]

Modifications in plans

Reagan meets with (left to right) Secretary of Defense Caspar Weinberger, Secretary of State George Shultz, Attorney General Ed Meese, and Chief of Staff Don Regan in the Oval Office

Robert McFarlane resigned on December 5, 1985,^[26] citing that he wanted to spend more time with his family;^[27] he was replaced by Admiral John Poindexter.

Two days later, Reagan met with his advisors at the White House, where a new plan was introduced. This one called for a slight change in the arms transactions: instead of the weapons going to the moderate Iranian group, they would go to moderate Iranian army leaders.^[28] As the weapons were delivered from Israel by air, the hostages held by Hezbollah would be released.^[28] Israel would still pay the United States for reimbursing the weapons. Though staunchly opposed by Secretary of State George Shultz and Secretary of Defense Caspar Weinberger, the plan was authorized by Reagan, who stated that, "We were not trading arms for hostages, nor were we negotiating with terrorists."^[29] Now retired National Security Advisor McFarlane flew to London to meet with Israelis and Ghorbanifar in an attempt to persuade the Iranian to use his influence to release the hostages before any arms transactions occurred; this plan was rejected by Ghorbanifar.^[28]

On the day of McFarlane's resignation, Oliver North, a military aide to the United States National Security Council (NSC), proposed a new plan for selling arms to Iran, which included two major adjustments: instead of selling arms through Israel, the sale was to be direct, and a portion of the proceeds would go to Contras, or Nicaraguan guerilla fighters opposed to communism, at a markup. North proposed a $15 million markup, while contracted arms broker Ghorbanifar added a 41% markup of his own.^[30] Other members of the NSC were in favor of North's plan; with large support, Poindexter authorized it without notifying President Reagan, and it went into effect.^[31] At first, the Iranians refused to buy the arms at the inflated price because of the excessive markup imposed by North and Ghorbanifar. They eventually relented, and in February 1986, 1,000 TOW missiles were shipped to the country.^[31] From May to November 1986, there were additional shipments of miscellaneous weapons and parts.^[31]

Both the sale of weapons to Iran, and the funding of the Contras, attempted to circumvent not only stated administration policy, but also the Boland Amendment.^[5] Administration officials argued that regardless of the Congress restricting the funds for the Contras, or any affair, the President (or in this case the administration) could carry on by seeking alternative means of funding such as private entities and foreign governments.^[32] Funding from one foreign country, Brunei, was botched when North's secretary, Fawn Hall, transposed the numbers of North's Swiss bank account number. A Swiss businessman, suddenly $10 million richer, alerted the authorities of the mistake. The money was eventually returned to the Sultan of Brunei, with interest.^[33]

On January 7, 1986, John Poindexter proposed to the president a modification of the approved plan: instead of negotiating with the moderate Iranian political group, the U.S. would negotiate with moderate members of the Iranian government.^[34] Poindexter told Reagan that Ghorbanifar had important connections within the Iranian government, so with the hope of the release of the hostages, Reagan approved this plan as well.^[34] Throughout February 1986, weapons were shipped directly to Iran by the United States (as part of Oliver North's plan, without the knowledge of President Reagan) and none of the hostages were released. Retired National Security Advisor McFarlane conducted another international voyage, this one to Tehran. He met directly with the moderate Iranian political group that sought to establish U.S.-Iranian relations in an attempt to free the four remaining hostages.^[35] This meeting also failed. The members requested demands such as Israel's withdrawal from the Golan Heights, which the United States rejected.^[35]

Subsequent dealings

In late July 1986, Hezbollah released another hostage, Father Lawrence Martin Jenco, former head of Catholic Relief Services in Lebanon. Following this, William Casey, head of the CIA, requested that the U.S. authorize sending a shipment of small missile parts to Iranian military forces as a way of expressing gratitude.^[36] Casey also justified this request by stating that the contact in the Iranian government might otherwise lose face, or be executed, and hostages killed. Reagan authorized the shipment to ensure that those potential events would not occur.^[36]

In September and October 1986 three more Americans — Frank Reed, Joseph Ciccipio, Edward Tracy — were abducted in Lebanon by a separate terrorist group. The reasons for their abduction are unknown, although it is speculated that they were kidnapped to replace the freed Americans.^[37] One more original hostage, David Jacobsen, was later released. The captors promised to release the remaining two, but the release never happened.^[38]

Discovery and scandal

North's mugshot, after his arrest

After a leak by Iranian radical Mehdi Hashemi, the Lebanese magazine Ash-Shiraa exposed the arrangement on November 3, 1986.^[11] This was the first public reporting of the weapons-for-hostages deal. The operation was discovered only after an airlift of guns was downed over Nicaragua. Eugene Hasenfus, who was captured by Nicaraguan authorities, initially alleged in a press conference on Nicaraguan soil that two of his coworkers, Max Gomez and Ramon Medina, worked for the Central Intelligence Agency.^[39] He later said he did not know whether they did or not.^[40] The Iranian government confirmed the Ash-Shiraa story, and ten days after the story was first published, President Ronald Reagan appeared on national television from the Oval Office on November 13 stating:

"My purpose was... to send a signal that the United States was prepared to replace the animosity between [the U.S. and Iran] with a new relationship... At the same time we undertook this initiative, we made clear that Iran must oppose all forms of international terrorism as a condition of progress in our relationship. The most significant step which Iran could take, we indicated, would be to use its influence in Lebanon to secure the release of all hostages held there."^[6]

The scandal was compounded when Oliver North destroyed or hid pertinent documents between November 21 and November 25, 1986. During North's trial in 1989, his secretary, Fawn Hall, testified extensively about helping North alter, shred, and remove official United States National Security Council (NSC) documents from the White House. According to The New York Times, enough documents were put into a government shredder to jam it.^[30] North's explanation for destroying some documents was to protect the lives of individuals involved in Iran and Contra operations.^[30] It wasn't until years after the trial that North's notebooks were made public, and only after the National Security Archive and Public Citizen sued the Office of the Independent Council under the Freedom of Information Act.^[30]

During the trial North testified that on November 21, 22, or 24, he witnessed Poindexter destroy what may have been the only signed copy of a presidential covert-action finding that sought to authorize CIA participation in the November 1985 Hawk missile shipment to Iran.^[30] US Attorney General Edwin Meese admitted on November 25 that profits from weapons sales to Iran were made available to assist the Contra rebels in Nicaragua. On the same day, John Poindexter resigned, and Oliver North was fired by President Reagan.^[41] Poindexter was replaced by Frank Carlucci on December 2, 1986.^[42]

In his expose Veil: The Secret Wars of the CIA 1981–1987, journalist Bob Woodward chronicles the role of the CIA in facilitating the transfer of funds from the Iran arms sales to the Nicaraguan Contras spearheaded by Oliver North.^[43] Then Director of the CIA, William J. Casey, admitted to Woodward in February 1987 that he was aware of the diversion of funds to the contras confirming a number of encounters documented by Woodward.^[44] The admission occurred while Casey was hospitalized for a stroke. On May 6, 1987 William Casey died the day after Congress began its public hearings on the Iran-contra affair.

Tower Commission

On November 25, 1986, President Reagan announced the creation of a Special Review Board to look into the matter; the following day, he appointed former Senator John Tower, former Secretary of State Edmund Muskie, and former National Security Adviser Brent Scowcroft to serve as members. This Presidential Commission took effect on December 1 and became known as the "Tower Commission". The main objectives of the commission were to inquire into "the circumstances surrounding the Iran-Contra matter, other case studies that might reveal strengths and weaknesses in the operation of the National Security Council system under stress, and the manner in which that system has served eight different Presidents since its inception in 1947."^[1] The commission was the first presidential commission to review and evaluate the National Security Council.

President Reagan (center) receives the Tower Commission Report in the White House Cabinet Room; John Tower is at left and Edmund Muskie is at right, 1987

President Reagan appeared before the Tower Commission on December 2, 1986, to answer questions regarding his involvement in the affair. When asked about his role in authorizing the arms deals, he first stated that he had; later, he appeared to contradict himself by stating that he had no recollection of doing so.^[45] In his 1990 autobiography, An American Life, Reagan acknowledges authorizing the shipments to Israel.^[46]

The report published by the Tower Commission was delivered to the President on February 26, 1987. The Commission had interviewed 80 witnesses to the scheme,^[1] including Reagan, and two of the arms trade middlemen: Manucher Ghorbanifar and Adnan Khashoggi.^[45] The 200 page report was the most comprehensive of any released,^[45] criticizing the actions of Oliver North, John Poindexter, Caspar Weinberger, and others. It determined that President Reagan did not have knowledge of the extent of the program, especially not the diversion of funds to the Contras,^[1] although it argued that the President ought to have had better control of the National Security Council staff.^[1] The report heavily criticized Reagan for not properly supervising his subordinates or being aware of their actions.^[1] A major result of the Tower Commission was the consensus that Reagan should have listened to his National Security Advisor more, thereby placing more power in the hands of that chair.^[1]

The Democratic-controlled United States Congress issued its own report on November 18, 1987, stating that "If the president did not know what his national security advisers were doing, he should have."^[2] The congressional report wrote that the president bore "ultimate responsibility" for wrongdoing by his aides, and his administration exhibited "secrecy, deception and disdain for the law."^[47] It also read in part: "The central remaining question is the role of the President in the Iran-contra affair. On this critical point, the shredding of documents by Poindexter, North and others, and the death of Casey, leave the record incomplete."^[5]

Aftermath

Reagan expressed regret regarding the situation during a nationally televised address from the White House Oval Office on March 4, 1987; Reagan had not spoken to the American people directly for three months amidst the scandal.^[48] President Reagan told the American people the reason why he did not update them on the scandal:

"The reason I haven't spoken to you before now is this: You deserve the truth. And as frustrating as the waiting has been, I felt it was improper to come to you with sketchy reports, or possibly even erroneous statements, which would then have to be corrected, creating even more doubt and confusion. There's been enough of that."^[48]

He then took full responsibility for the acts committed:

"First, let me say I take full responsibility for my own actions and for those of my administration. As angry as I may be about activities undertaken without my knowledge, I am still accountable for those activities. As disappointed as I may be in some who served me, I'm still the one who must answer to the American people for this behavior."^[48]

Finally, the president stated that his previous assertions that the U.S. did not trade arms for hostages were incorrect:

"A few months ago I told the American people I did not trade arms for hostages. My heart and my best intentions still tell me that's true, but the facts and the evidence tell me it is not. As the Tower board reported, what began as a strategic opening to Iran deteriorated, in its implementation, into trading arms for hostages. This runs counter to my own beliefs, to administration policy, and to the original strategy we had in mind."^[48]

Domestically, the scandal precipitated a drop in President Reagan's popularity as his approval ratings saw "the largest single drop for any U.S. president in history", from 67% to 46% in November 1986, according to a New York Times/CBS News poll.^[49] The "Teflon President", as Reagan was nicknamed by critics,^[50] survived the scandal, however, and by January 1989 a Gallup poll was "recording a 64% approval rating," the highest ever recorded for a departing President at that time.^[51]

Internationally the damage was more severe. Magnus Ranstorp wrote, "U.S. willingness to engage in concessions with Iran and the Hezbollah not only signalled to its adversaries that hostage-taking was an extremely useful instrument in extracting political and financial concessions for the West but also undermined any credibility of U.S. criticism of other states' deviation from the principles of no-negotiation and no concession to terrorists and their demands."^[52]

In Iran Mehdi Hashemi, the leaker of the scandal, was executed in 1987, allegedly for activities unrelated to the scandal. Though Hashemi made a full video confession to numerous serious charges, some observers find the coincidence of his leak and the subsequent prosecution highly suspicious.^[53]

Convictions, pardons, and reinstatements

Oliver North and John Poindexter were indicted on multiple charges on March 16, 1988.^[54] North, indicted on 16 counts, was found guilty by a jury of three minor counts. The convictions were vacated on appeal on the grounds that North's Fifth Amendment rights may have been violated by the indirect use of his testimony to Congress which had been given under a grant of immunity. In 1990, Poindexter was convicted on several felony counts of conspiracy, lying to Congress, obstruction of justice, and altering and destroying documents pertinent to the investigation. His convictions were also overturned on appeal on similar grounds. Arthur L. Liman served as chief counsel for the Senate during the Iran-Contra Affair.^[55]

The Independent Counsel, Lawrence E. Walsh, chose not to re-try North or Poindexter. Caspar Weinberger was indicted for lying to the Independent Counsel but was later pardoned by President George H. W. Bush.^[56]

In 1992 George H. W. Bush pardoned six administration officials, namely Elliott Abrams, Duane R. Clarridge, Alan Fiers, Clair George, Robert McFarlane, and Caspar Weinberger.^[57]

George W. Bush selected some individuals that served under Reagan for high-level posts in his presidential administration.^[58][59] They include:

• Elliott Abrams:^[60] under Bush, the Special Assistant to the President and Senior Director on the National Security Council for Near East and North African Affairs; in Iran-Contra, pleaded guilty on two counts of unlawfully withholding information, pardoned.

• Otto Reich:^[61] head of the Office of Public Diplomacy under Reagan.

• John Negroponte:^[62] under Bush, served as the Ambassador to Iraq, the National Intelligence Director, and the Deputy Secretary of State.

• Admiral John Poindexter:^[63] under Bush, Director of the Information Awareness Office; in Iran-Contra, found guilty of multiple felony counts for conspiracy, obstruction of justice, lying to Congress, defrauding the government, and the alteration and destruction of evidence, convictions reversed.

In Poindexter's hometown of Odon, Indiana, a street was renamed to John Poindexter Street. Bill Breeden, a former minister, stole the street's sign in protest of the Iran-Contra Affair. He claimed that he was holding it for a ransom of $30 million, in reference to the amount of money given to Iran to transfer to the Contras. He was later arrested and confined to prison, making him, as satirized by Howard Zinn, "the only person to be imprisoned as a result of the Iran-Contra affair."^[64]

See also

• Lebanon hostage crisis
• Iran – United States relations
• United States and state terrorism
• CIA drug trafficking
• Gary Webb

• Mistakes were made
• Nicaragua v. United States
• Nahum Manbar
• Barry Seal
• Eugene Hasenfus
• List of people pardoned by George H. W. Bush

Footnotes

1. ^ ^{a b c d e f g h i j k} "Tower commission report excerpts". The Tower Commission Report. http://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/PS157/assignment%20files%20public/TOWER%20EXCERPTS.htm. Retrieved 2008-06-07. 
2. ^ ^{a b c d} "Reagan's mixed White House legacy". BBC. June 6, 2004. http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/213195.stm. Retrieved 2008-04-22. 
3. ^ Hart, Robert (June 2, 2004). "NYT's apologies miss the point". The Consortium for Independent Journalism, Inc. http://www.consortiumnews.com/2004/060204.html. Retrieved 2008-06-07. 
4. ^ Reagan, Ronald (1990), p. 542
5. ^ ^{a b c d e} "The Iran-Contra Report". The American Presidency Project. http://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/PS157/assignment%20files%20public/congressional%20report%20key%20sections.htm. Retrieved 2008-05-17. 
6. ^ ^{a b} Reagan, Ronald (November 13, 1986). "Address to the Nation on the Iran Arms and Contra Aid Controversy". Ronald Reagan Presidential Foundation. http://www.reagan.utexas.edu/archives/speeches/1986/111386c.htm. Retrieved 2008-06-07. 
7. ^ "Excerpts From the Iran-Contra Report: A Secret Foreign Policy". The New York Times. 1994. http://www.nytimes.com/books/97/06/29/reviews/iran-transcript.html. Retrieved 2008-06-07. 
8. ^ Reagan, Ronald (March 4, 1987). "Address to the Nation on the Iran Arms and Contra Aid Controversy". Ronald Reagan Presidential Foundation. http://www.reagan.utexas.edu/archives/speeches/1987/030487h.htm. Retrieved 2008-06-07. 
9. ^ Dwyer, Paula. "Pointing a Finger at Reagan". Business Week. http://www.businessweek.com/1997/25/b353254.htm. Retrieved 2008-04-22. 
10. ^ "Pardons and Commutations Granted by President George H. W. Bush". United States Department of Justice. http://www.usdoj.gov/pardon/bushgrants.htm. Retrieved 2008-04-22. 
11. ^ ^{a b} Cave, George. "Why Secret 1986 U.S.-Iran “Arms for Hostages” Negotiations Failed". Washington Report on Middle Eastern Affairs. http://www.wrmea.com/backissues/0994/9409008.htm. Retrieved 2007-01-09. 
12. ^ "Iran-Contra: White House e-mail". CNN. http://www.cnn.com/SPECIALS/cold.war/episodes/18/archive/. Retrieved 2008-06-07. 
13. ^ Seden, Gil (July 14, 2006). "Who is Hezbollah?". The Australian Jewish News. http://www.ajn.com.au/news/news.asp?pgID=1113. Retrieved 2008-06-11. ^{[dead link]}
14. ^ ^{a b c} "The Iran-Contra affair". The American-Israeli Cooperative Enterprise. http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/US-Israel/Iran_Contra_Affair.html. Retrieved 2008-06-07. 
15. ^ "Military history of the Iran–Iraq War, 1980-1988". GlobalSecurity.org. 2005. http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/world/war/iran-iraq.htm. Retrieved 2008-06-07. 
16. ^ ^{a b c d} Reagan, Ronald (1990), p. 504
17. ^ ^{a b c d} Reagan, Ronald (1990), p. 505
18. ^ Walsh Iran / Contra Report - Chapter 24 The Investigation of State Department Officials: Shultz, Hill and Platt Retrieved on 2008-06-07
19. ^ Walsh Iran/Contra Report, Part I: The Underlying Facts.
20. ^ Reagan, Ronald (1990), p. 506
21. ^ Butterfield, Fox (November 27, 1988). "Arms for Hostages — Plain and Simple". The New York Times. http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=940DE6DB1531F934A15752C1A96E948260&sec=&spon=&pagewanted=all. Retrieved 2008-04-22. 
22. ^ "Iran-Contra Report; Arms, Hostages and Contras: How a Secret Foreign Policy Unraveled" March 16, 1984. Retrieved on 2008-06-07
23. ^ Watson, Laurie (November 6, 1988). "Errors By Crew Reportedly Cited In Gander Crash". United Press International (The Philadelphia Inquirer): p. A33. 
24. ^ "Ceremonies mark anniversary of deadly Newfoundland air crash". CBC. December 12, 2005. http://www.cbc.ca/canada/story/2005/12/12/Air-Arrow-051212.html. Retrieved 2008-06-11. 
25. ^ "CASB Minority Report". Sandforn.Org. http://www.sandford.org/gandercrash/investigations/minority_report/html/_6.shtml#Findings. Retrieved 2009-07-04. 
26. ^ "United States v. Robert C. McFarlane". Independent Council for Iran/Contra Matters. 1993. http://www.globalsecurity.org/intell/library/reports/1993/walsh/chap_01.htm. Retrieved 2008-06-07. 
27. ^ Reagan, Ronald (1990), p. 509
28. ^ ^{a b c} Reagan, Ronald (1990), p. 510
29. ^ Reagan, Ronald (1990), p. 512
30. ^ ^{a b c d e} Walsh, Lawrence (August 4, 1993). "Vol. I: Investigations and prosecutions". Final report of the independent counsel for Iran/Contra matters. Independent Council for Iran/Contra Matters. http://www.fas.org/irp/offdocs/walsh/. Retrieved 2009-05-15. 
31. ^ ^{a b c} Avery, Steve (2005). "Irangate: Iran-Contra affair, 1985-1992". U-S-History.com. http://www.u-s-history.com/pages/h1889.html. Retrieved 2008-06-07. 
32. ^ Fisher, Louis (October 1989). "How Tightly Can Congress Draw the Purse Strings?". American Journal of International Law 83 (4): 758–766. doi:10.2307/2203364. http://links.jstor.org/sici?sici=0002-9300(198910)83%3A4%3C758%3AHTCCDT%3E2.0.CO%3B2-N. Retrieved 2006-10-10. 
33. ^ "Iran Contra Hearings; Brunei Regains $10 Million". New York Times. 1987-07-22. http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9B0DEED7133DF931A15754C0A961948260. Retrieved 2008-03-28. 
34. ^ ^{a b} Reagan, Ronald (1990), p. 516
35. ^ ^{a b} Reagan, Ronald (1990), pp. 520-521
36. ^ ^{a b} Reagan, Ronald (1990), p. 523
37. ^ Ranstorp, Magnus, Hizb'allah in Lebanon: The Politics of the Western Hostage Crisis, New York, St. Martins Press, 1997 pp. 98-99
38. ^ Reagan, Ronald (1990), pp. 526-527
39. ^ "IN SUMMARY; Nicaragua Downs Plane and Survivor Implicates C.I.A". The New York Times. http://select.nytimes.com/gst/abstract.html?res=F50717F83B5E0C718DDDA90994DE484D81&n=Top%2fReference%2fTimes%20Topics%2fOrganizations%2fC%2fCentral%20Intelligence%20Agency%20. Retrieved 2008-06-07. 
40. ^ "Hasenfus Tempers Comments on CIA". The New York Times. http://select.nytimes.com/gst/abstract.html?res=F50714FD3D550C708CDDA80994DE484D81&n=Top%2fReference%2fTimes%20Topics%2fOrganizations%2fC%2fCentral%20Intelligence%20Agency%20. Retrieved 2008-06-07. 
41. ^ "White House Shake-Up: A Task is Handed to State Dept.; Poindexter and North Have Limited Options". The New York Times. http://select.nytimes.com/gst/abstract.html?res=F5071FFD3C550C758EDDA80994DE484D81&n=Top%2fReference%2fTimes%20Topics%2fPeople%2fP%2fPoindexter%2c%20John%20M%2e. Retrieved 2008-06-07. 
42. ^ "Timeline of Ronald Reagan's life". PBS. 2000. http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/amex/reagan/timeline/index_5.html. Retrieved 2008-06-07. 
43. ^ Woodward, Bob (1987). VEIL: The Secret Wars of the CIA 1981-1987. New York: Simon and Schuster. 
44. ^ Woodward, Bob (1987). VEIL: The Secret Wars of the CIA 1981-1987. New York: Simon and Schuster. pp. 580. 
45. ^ ^{a b c} Church, George J. "Tower of Judgement". Time. http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,963668,00.html. Retrieved 2008-04-22. 
46. ^ Reagan, Ronald (1990), p. 501
47. ^ Blumenthal, Sidney (June 9, 2005). "Nixon's Empire Strikes Back". The Guardian. http://www.guardian.co.uk/print/0,3858,5211614-103677,00.html. Retrieved 2008-06-06. 
48. ^ ^{a b c d} "Speech about Iran Contra". PBS. March 4, 1987. http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/amex/reagan/filmmore/reference/primary/irancontra.html. Retrieved 2008-04-23. 
49. ^ Mayer, Jane and Doyle McManus, Landslide: The Unmaking of The President, 1984-1988. Houghton Mifflin, (1988) p.292 and 437
50. ^ "Teflon president not a compliment". The Washington Post (The Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel). June 7, 2004. http://www.jsonline.com/story/index.aspx?id=235102. Retrieved 2008-06-10. 
51. ^ Sussman, Dalia (2001-08-06). "Improving With Age: Reagan Approval Grows Better in Retrospect". ABC. http://abcnews.go.com/sections/politics/DailyNews/poll_reagan010806.html. Retrieved 2007-04-08. 
52. ^ Ranstorp, Magnus, Hizb'allah in Lebanon: The Politics of the Western Hostage Crisis, New York, St. Martins Press, 1997 p.203
53. ^ Abrahamian, Tortured Confessions, University of California, (1999), pp 162-166
54. ^ Shenon, Philip. "North, Poindexter and 2 Others Indicted on Iran-Contra Fraud and Theft Charges". The New York Times. http://select.nytimes.com/gst/abstract.html?res=FB0716F63B5B0C748DDDAA0894D0484D81&n=Top%2fReference%2fTimes%20Topics%2fPeople%2fP%2fPoindexter%2c%20John%20M%2e. Retrieved 2008-06-07. 
55. ^ Haberman, Clyde (July 18, 1997). "Arthur L. Liman, a Masterly Lawyer, Dies at 64". The New York Times. http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9C0DEED71E38F93BA25754C0A961958260&sec=&spon=&pagewanted=all. Retrieved 2008-06-06. 
56. ^ Johnston, David (December 25, 1992). "Bush Pardons 6 in Iran Affair, Aborting a Weinberger Trial; Prosecutor Assails 'Cover-Up'". The New York Times. http://www.nytimes.com/books/97/06/29/reviews/iran-pardon.html. Retrieved 2008-06-06. 
57. ^ Bush, George H.W. (December 24, 1992). "Proclamation 6518 - Grant of Executive Clemency". The American Presidency Project. http://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/ws/print.php?pid=20265. Retrieved 2008-04-23. 
58. ^ Campbell, Duncan. "Bush nominees under fire for link with contras". The Guardian. http://www.guardian.co.uk/bush/story/0,7369,469208,00.html. Retrieved 2006-10-12. 
59. ^ "Return of the Iran-Contra brigade". The Observer. http://observer.guardian.co.uk/international/story/0,6903,856095,00.html. Retrieved 2006-10-12. 
60. ^ "Personnel Announcement". The White House. http://georgewbush-whitehouse.archives.gov/news/releases/2005/02/20050202-10.html. Retrieved 2006-10-10. 
61. ^ "Biography: Otto Juan Reich". United States Embassy to Uruguay. January 16, 2002. http://uruguay.usembassy.gov/bioreicheng.htm. Retrieved 2008-06-10. 
62. ^ "President Congratulates America's First Director and Deputy Director of National Intelligence". The White House. http://georgewbush-whitehouse.archives.gov/news/releases/2005/05/20050518.html. Retrieved 2006-10-10. 
63. ^ Sutherland, John. "No more Mr Scrupulous Guy". The Guardian. http://www.guardian.co.uk/Archive/Article/0,4273,4358017,00.html. Retrieved 2006-10-10. 
64. ^ Zinn, Howard (2003), pp. 587-588

References

• Asleson, Vern. Nicaragua: Those Passed By. Galde Press ISBN 1-931942-16-1, 2004

• Cockburn, Alexander and Jeffrey St. Clair (1998). Whiteout, the CIA, drugs and the press. New York City: Verso. ISBN 1859842585. 

• Reagan, Ronald (1990). An American Life. New York: Simon & Schuster. 

• "Report of the Congressional Committees Investigating the Iran-Contra Affair (S. Rep. No. 216, H.R. Rep. No. 433, 100th Cong., 1st Sess.)". United States Government Printing Office, via Google Books. November 11, 1987. http://books.google.com/books?vid=ISBN0788126024&id=ew_K3auTwEgC&pg=PA3&lpg=PA3&dq=committees&as_brr=1&sig=jrbRSeUgdNVpav3Eh1pijaCG-sY#PPR1,M1. Retrieved 2007-04-03. 

• Shenon, Philip and Stephen Engelberg (July 5, 1987). "Eight Important Days in November: Unraveling the Iran-Contra Affair". The New York Times. http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9B0DE6DC1F3EF936A35754C0A961948260. Retrieved 2008-03-28. 

• Tower, John; Edmund Muskie and Brent Scowcroft (February 26, 1987). "Tower Commission Report (Excerpts)". The American Presidency Project. http://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/PS157/assignment%20files%20public/TOWER%20EXCERPTS.htm. Retrieved 2008-04-23. 

• Webb, Gary (1998). Dark Alliance: The CIA, the Contras, and the crack cocaine explosion. Seven Stories Press. ISBN 1888363681. 

• Zinn, Howard (2003). A People's History of the United States. New York: Perennial. ISBN 0060528370. 

External links

• Times Article
• Arms for Hostages
• Story needs to be told
• The Iran-Contra Affair 20 Years On: Documents Spotlight Role of Reagan, Top Aides. By the National Security Archive
• How the Reagan Administration Taught Iran the Wrong Lessons – Middle East Review of International Affairs, June, 2007 article by Nathan Thrall
• "The Secret Government: The Constitution in Crisis" (Audio, Video) -- 1987 Bill Moyers special on the Iran-Contra Affair
• Condensed article outlining Iran-Contra
• Final Report of the Independent Counsel for Iran/Contra Matters (Walsh Report)

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This entry is from Wikipedia, the leading user-contributed encyclopedia. It may not have been reviewed by professional editors (see full disclaimer)

It was a series of actions on the part of U.S. federal government officials, which came to light in November 1986. The discoveries had the immediate effect of hurting President Ronald Reagan (1911-2004), whose policy of antiterrorism had been undermined by activities initiated from his own executive office. Following in-depth hearings and investigations into "who knew what, when," special prosecutor Lawrence Walsh (1912-) submitted his report on January 18, 1994, stating that the dealings with Iran and with the contra rebels in Nicaragua had "violated United States policy and law."

The tangled string of events involved Reagan's national security advisers Robert McFarlane (1937-) and Admiral John Poindexter (1936-), Lieutenant Colonel Oliver North (1943-), Poindexter's military aide, the Iranian government, and Nicaraguan rebels.

The U.S. officials evidently had begun their dealings with both the Iranian government and the Nicaraguan rebels with the goal of freeing seven Americans who were held hostage by Iranian-backed rebels in Lebanon. President Reagan had met with the families of the captives and was naturally concerned about the hostage situation. Under pressure to work to free the hostages, McFarlane, Poindexter, and North arranged to sell an estimated $30 million in spare parts and antiaircraft missiles to Iran (then at war with neighboring Iraq). In return, the Iranian government would put pressure on the terrorist groups to release the Americans.

Profits from the arms sale to Iran were then diverted by Lieutenant North to the contras in Central America who were fighting the dictatorial Nicaraguan government. Congress had already passed laws that prohibited U.S. government aid to the Nicaraguan rebels; the diversion of funds certainly appeared to violate those laws.

The Iran-Contra affair led to North's dismissal and to Poindexter's resignation. Both men were prosecuted. Though the hostages were freed, Reagan's public image was seriously damaged by how the release had been achieved.

During the Iran-Contra hearings in 1987, National Security Commission officials revealed that they had been willing to take the risk of providing arms to Iran in exchange for the safe release of the hostages because they all remembered the U.S. government's failed attempt in 1980 to rescue hostages held at the American Embassy in Tehran, Iran.

Nevertheless, the deal with Iran had supplied a hostile country with American arms that could then be used against the United States. In 1987 Iran did launch an offensive when it attacked Kuwaiti oil-tankers that were registered as American and laid mines in the Persian Gulf. The United States responded by sending in the navy, which attacked Iranian patrol boats. During this military initiative, the U.S. Navy accidentally shot down a civilian passenger jet, killing everyone on board.