Iran Contra Affair
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. The Iran-Contra Affair was a political scandal in the United States in 1987.[1] Large volumes of documents relating to the scandal were destroyed or withheld from investigators by Reagan Administration officials.[2] The affair is still shrouded in secrecy and discovering the facts is very difficult. It involved several members of the Reagan Administration who in 1986 helped to illegally sell arms to Iran, an avowed enemy, and used the proceeds to fund, also illegally, the Contras, a right-wing insurgent organization in Nicaragua. [3] After the arms sales were revealed in November 1986, President Ronald Reagan appeared on national television and denied that they had occurred.[4] A week later, however, on November 13, Reagan returned to the airwaves to affirm that weapons were indeed transferred to Iran. He denied that they were part of an exchange for hostages. [5] The affair The affair links quite disparate matters: on the one hand was the arms sales to Iran, and on the other, funding of Contra militants in Nicaragua. Direct funding had been made illegal through the Boland Amendment. The affair emerged when a Lebanese newspaper reported that the U.S. sold arms to Iran in exchange for the release of hostages by Hezbollah. E-mails sent by Oliver North to John Poindexter support this.[6] However, the Israeli ambassador to the U.S. claims that the reason was to establish links with elements of the military in Iran. It is also noteworthy that the Contras did not receive all of their finances from arms sales, but also through drug trafficking of which the US was found to be aware.[7]This is detailed in the "Drug money" section below. Hostage taking In the late 1970s and early 1980s, the Middle East faced frequent hostage-taking incidents by organizations. In 1979, Iranian students took hostage 66 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 in the Middle East did not end there, however.[8] In 1983, members of Al-Dawa ("The Call"), an exiled Iraqi political party turned militant organization, were imprisoned for their part in a series of truck bombs in Kuwait. In response to the imprisonment, Hezbollah, an ally of Al-Dawa, took 30 Western hostages, [9] six of whom were American. Hezbollah demanded the release of the prisoners for these hostages. Members of the Reagan Administration claim they believed that by selling arms to Iran, Iran would influence the Hezbollah kidnappers in Lebanon to release their hostages. 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. [10] The sale of arms would also, according to National Security Adviser Robert McFarlane, improve strained relations with Iran.[1] For that reason, weapons were transferred to Iran. Arms transaction The Iran-Contra report found that the sales of arms to Iran violated United States Government policy; it also violated the Arms Export Control Act.[2] Overall, if the releasing of hostages was the purpose of arms sales to Iran, the plan was a failure as only three of the 30 hostages were released.[9] First arms sale Michael Ledeen, a consultant of Robert McFarlane, asked Israeli Prime Minister Shimon Peres for help in the sale of arms to Iran.[11] The general idea behind the plan was for Israel to ship weapons to Iran, then the US would reimburse Israel with the same weapons. 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. [11] Reagan approved McFarlane's idea to reach out to Iran on July 18, 1985 while in a hospital bed recovering from cancer surgery.[12] [12] In July 1985, Israel sent American-made BGM-71 TOW (Tube-launched, Optically-tracked, Wire-guided) anti-tank missiles to Iran through an arms dealer named Manucher Ghorbanifar, a friend of Iran's Prime Minister. One hostage, reverend Benjamin Weir was subsequently released; despite the fact that arms were being sold to Iran, only Weir was released. This resulted in the failure of Ledeen's plan [8] with only three shipments through Israel. [11] Subsequent dealings Robert McFarlane resigned in December 1985[13]. He was replaced by Admiral John Poindexter. 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. This time, there were two new ideas. Instead of selling arms through Israel, the sale was to be direct. Second, the proceeds from the sale would go to the Contras at a markup. Oliver North wanted a $15 million markup, while contracted Iranian arms broker Manucher Ghorbanifar added a 41% markup of his own. [14] Other members of the NSC were in favor of North's plan. John Poindexter authorized the plan, and it went into effect. [15] At first, the Iranians refused to buy the arms at the inflated price because of the excessive markup imposed by North and Ghorbanifar. In February 1986, 1000 TOW missiles were shipped to Iran.[15] From May to November 1986, there were additional shipments of miscellaneous weapons and parts.[15] Reagan claimed that the total of all arms sales was less than a planeload.[5] The Contras The plan went ahead, and proceeds from the arms sales went to the Contras, a right-wing guerilla organization engaged in an insurgency against the leftist Sandinista government of Nicaragua. The diversion was coordinated by Oliver North of the National Security Council. Supporting the Contras financially was an effort to assist them in their fight against the Nicaraguan government. Both the sale of weapons to Iran and the funding of the Contras attempted to circumvent not only stated Administration policy, but also legislation passed by Congress known as the Boland Amendment. Administration officials argued that regardless of the Congress restricting the funds for the Contras, or any affair, the President (the administration) could carry on by seeking alternative means of funding such as private entities and foreign governments.[16] The Contras were also involved in drug trafficking, as detailed in the "Drug money" section below. Discovery and scandal Whatever the reasons for US arms sales to Iran, the aborted deal caused political strife in the United States when the details became public knowledge. The Lebanese magazine Ash-Shiraa exposed the arrangement on November 3, 1986.[17] [18] [19] This was the first public reporting of the alleged 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 CIA.[20] He later said he did not know whether they did or not.[21]The Iranian government confirmed the Ash-Shiraa story, and ten days after the story was first published, President Ronald Reagan affirmed the truth of the matter. In a televised speech, on November 13, Reagan confirmed the sale of weapons to Iran and stated the reasons for the sale of weapons. He also claimed that only a planeload worth of weapons were sent to Iran. "My purpose was... to send a signal that the United States was prepared to replace the animosity between us 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.."[5] The scandal was compounded when on November 21, Oliver North and his secretary Fawn Hall shredded pertinent documents. 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.[22] Poindexter was replaced by Frank Carlucci on December 2, 1986. [12] Tower Commission On November 25, 1986, President Reagan, faced with mounting pressure from Congressional Democrats and the media, announced the creation of a Special Review Board looking into the matter and the next day assigned former Senator John Tower, former Secretary of State Edmund Muskie, and former National Security Adviser Brent Scowcroft to serve as members; this Presidential Commission would take effect on December 1 and became known as the Tower Commission. The commission was the first presidential commission to review and evaluate the National Security Council. The objectives of the Tower 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." [23] President Reagan appeared before the Tower Commission on December 2, 1986, to answer questions. His answers were not entirely consistent, and he was (allegedly) plagued with poor memory, because the questions were regarding details that occurred months and years prior. [12] The report published by the Tower Commission, known as the Tower Commission Report, was delivered to the President on February 26, 1987. It criticized the actions of Oliver North, John Poindexter, Defense Secretary Caspar Weinberger and others. It did not determine that the President had knowledge of the extent of the program, although it argued that the President ought to have had better control of the National Security Council staff. The wording of the report surprised some since it was expected to have been weak in its criticism of the President. Instead, it heavily criticized President Reagan for not properly supervising his subordinates or being aware of their actions. The U.S. Congress issued its own report on November 18, 1987, indicating that "If the president did not know what his national security advisers were doing, he should have." [2]" The congressional report stated that the President bore "ultimate responsibility" for wrongdoing by his aides, and his Administration exhibited "secrecy, deception and disdain for the law." 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. The National Security Advisor was to be seen as an "honest broker" and not someone who would use the position to further his or her political agenda. Some doubted the intentions of the Tower Commission and believed that it was a political stunt.[citation needed] The commission had limited its criticism of Vice President George Bush[citation needed]. Subsequently, the head of the commission, John Tower, was nominated to the position of Secretary of Defense by Bush when he became President. He was not confirmed by the Senate. Some Democrats used the nomination to retaliate against President George H.W. Bush for what they viewed as 'negative' (though successful) campaign tactics against their nominee, Michael Dukakis. Others, including the conservative organizer Paul Weyrich, accused Tower (accurately, the evidence suggests) of having been involved in extramarital affairs and heavy drinking. One of Tower's leading critics was Senate Armed Services Committee Chairman Sam Nunn, a Georgia Democrat. Brent Scowcroft was named National Security Advisor. [24] Aftermath Oliver North and John Poindexter were indicted on multiple charges on March 16, 1988.[25] 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 lying to Congress, obstruction of justice, conspiracy, and altering and destroying documents pertinent to the investigation. His convictions were also overturned on appeal on similar grounds. The Independent Counsel, Lawrence E. Walsh, chose not to re-try North or Poindexter. Weinberger was indicted for lying to the Independent Counsel but was later pardoned by President George H.W. Bush. Faced with undeniable evidence of his involvement in the scandal, Reagan expressed regret regarding the situation at a nationally televised White House press conference on Ash Wednesday, March 4, 1987. Responding to questions, Reagan stated that his previous assertions that the U.S. did not trade arms for hostages were incorrect. He also stated that the Vice President knew of the plan. Reagan survived the scandal, and his approval ratings returned to previous levels; as the scandal broke in 1986, "Reagan's approval rating plummeted to 46%", but he later "finished strong with a December 1988 Gallup poll recording a 63% approval rating".[26] Drug money See also: CIA and Contra's cocaine trafficking in the US From the 1980s onward, allegations were made that the Contras were being funded through cocaine distribution. One of the earliest such allegations was contained in a lawsuit filed in 1986 by two journalists represented by the Christic Institute, alleging that the CIA and other parties were engaged in criminal acts, including financing the purchase of arms with the proceeds of cocaine sales.[27] The suit was dismissed; several of the named participants subsequently sued the Christic Institute for libel and won. Senator John Kerry's 1988 U.S. Senate Committee on Foreign Relations report on Contra drug links, which was released on April 13, 1989, concluded that "senior U.S. policy makers were not immune to the idea that drug money was a perfect solution to the Contras' funding problems."[28] The Kerry Committee report further stated that members of the U.S. State Department "who provided support for the Contras were involved in drug trafficking...and elements of the Contras themselves knowingly received financial and material assistance from drug traffickers."[29] Kerry was suspicious of North's connection with Manuel Noriega, Panama's drug baron. According to the National Security Archive, Oliver North had been in contact with Noriega and had met him personally. The report went on to say that "the Contra drug links included...payments to drug traffickers by the U.S. State Department of funds authorized by the Congress for humanitarian assistance to the Contras, in some cases after the traffickers had been indicted by federal law enforcement agencies on drug charges, in others while traffickers were under active investigation by these same agencies." Houses of the Congress began to raise questions about the drug-related allegations associated with the Contras, causing a review in the spring of 1986 of the allegations by the State Department, in conjunction with the Justice Department and relevant U.S. intelligence agencies.[30] The allegations resurfaced in 1996 when journalist Gary Webb published reports in the San Jose Mercury News[31], and later in his book Dark Alliance[32], detailing how Contras had distributed crack cocaine into Los Angeles to fund weapons purchases. These reports were initially attacked by various other newspapers, which attempted to debunk the link, citing official reports that apparently cleared the CIA. The Wall Street Journal reported on January 29, 1997 [33]on activities at the Mena, Arkansas airport allegedly involved then-governor Bill Clinton in a coverup of illegal drug-trading activity. The Wall Street Journal article goes on to state: At the center of the web of speculation spun around Mena are a few undisputed facts: One of the most successful drug informants in U.S. history, smuggler Barry Seal, based his air operation at Mena. At the height of his career he was importing as much as 1,000 pounds of cocaine per month, and had a personal fortune estimated at more than $50 million. After becoming an informant for the Drug Enforcement Administration, he worked at least once with the CIA, in a Sandinista drug sting. He was gunned down by Colombian hit men in Baton Rouge, La., in 1986; eight months later, one of his planes--with an Arkansas pilot at the wheel and Eugene Hasenfus in the cargo bay--was shot down over Nicaragua with a load of Contra supplies. In 1998, CIA Inspector General Frederick Hitz published a two-volume report[34] that substantiated many of Webb's claims, and described how 50 contras and contra-related entities involved in the drug trade had been protected from law enforcement activity by the Reagan-Bush administration, and documented a cover-up of evidence relating to these activities. The report also showed that Oliver North and the NSC were aware of these activities. A report later that same year by the Justice Department Inspector General Michael Bromwich also came to similar conclusions. In 2004, Gary Webb allegedly committed suicide by shooting himself twice in the head. Persons involved pardoned and reinstated In 1992 U.S. President George H.W. Bush pardoned six people involved in the scandal,[35] namely Elliott Abrams, Duane R. Clarridge, Alan Fiers, Clair George, Robert C. McFarlane, and Caspar W. Weinberger. George W. Bush selected some individuals that served under Reagan for high-level posts in his presidential administration.[36][37] They include: * Elliott Abrams:[38] 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:[39] head of the Office of Public Diplomacy under Reagan. * John Negroponte:[40] under Bush, the National Intelligence Director. * Admiral John Poindexter:[41] 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. * Robert Gates: [42] under Bush, confirmed on December 6, 2006 as the new Secretary of Defense to replace the resigning Donald Rumsfeld. Served as Director of Central Intelligence from 1991-1993 under George H.W. Bush. During Iran Contra he was Deputy Director of Central Intelligence. * Charles E. Allen: [43] under Bush, appointed in August 2005 to be chief intelligence officer at the Department of Homeland Security. Allen's position at DHS was not subject to Senate confirmation. Prior to the DHS appointment, Allen had worked 47 years at the CIA. Director of Central Intelligence William Webster formally reprimanded Allen for failing to fully comply with the DCI's request for full cooperation in the agency's internal Iran-Contra scandal investigation. However coworkers of Allen pointed out that Webster reprimanded the one person in the CIA who had brought his suspicions of a funds diversion to Robert Gates. [Eclipse: The Last Days of the CIA, Mark Perry, 1992, p. 216.] See also * United States-Iran relations * Allegations of state terrorism by United States of America * Barry Seal * CIA drug trafficking * List of Pardons and Commutations by President George H. W. Bush * Mistakes were made * Orlando Letelier * Operation Condor * Swedish Prime Minister Olof Palme's 1986 murder * Nicaragua v. United States, indictment by the International Court of Justice * US/Saudi AWACS Sale * War on Drugs
