Speaker 1: Okay, everyone, buckle up for the thrilling conclusion of Iran
Speaker 1: Contra Shady in the Eighties, Part two.
Speaker 2: Welcome to Stuff You Should Know, a production of iHeartRadio.
Speaker 1: Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark. There's
Speaker 1: Charles t w Tuck, Brian, there's Jerry over there. And
Speaker 1: this is Stuff you Should Know. Iran Contra Part two,
Speaker 1: starting now go.
Speaker 2: Maybe we should do a quick catch up. Okay, well
Speaker 2: we're still going. You act to like I just went
Speaker 2: to sleep.
Speaker 1: No, it's true.
Speaker 2: So what's going on here is the United States is
Speaker 2: Congress has decided that we cannot fund the Contras to
Speaker 2: fight the Sandinistas in Nicaragua. Shut off funding. So the
Speaker 2: Reagan administration makes a deep covert push to continue doing
Speaker 2: so right through a bunch of fun and shady ways.
Speaker 1: Right, they're fundraising, they're directly arming the Contras, they're training them,
Speaker 1: doing all sorts of crazy stuff.
Speaker 2: Yes, but if you know that this is about Iran
Speaker 2: Contra and you're like, what about Iran? What's going on here?
Speaker 2: I haven't heard anything about Iran?
Speaker 1: Keep your socks on.
Speaker 2: Well, here we go. This is where Iran enters.
Speaker 1: The picture, right, you can take your socks off, all right,
Speaker 1: go are your socks on?
Speaker 2: I've got on little footy socks.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I do too cool. Oh, Jerry does too sweet.
Speaker 1: It's the way to go.
Speaker 2: Jerry has those true footies where you can't even see
Speaker 2: him at all. I can see you mind peak out
Speaker 2: just a little, which I'm not a huge fan of.
Speaker 1: Well, check out my mind.
Speaker 2: Yeah, noms, no sms.
Speaker 1: Okay, enter Iran. We really that was a great intro
Speaker 1: and it just went away.
Speaker 2: That's right.
Speaker 1: So on the other side of the world from Nicker,
Speaker 1: there was another foreign policy disaster simmering that Reagan had going,
Speaker 1: and it was in the form of Iran, and specifically,
Speaker 1: it wasn't even the form of run. It was in
Speaker 1: the form of a problem that America had doesn't really
Speaker 1: have much these days, but definitely did in the seventies
Speaker 1: and eighties where Americans would be taken hostage around the world,
Speaker 1: but specifically, almost exclusively by Lebanese terrorists who were, if
Speaker 1: not working on behalf of Iran, were definitely sponsored by Iran.
Speaker 1: And regardless of who was president, the fact that there
Speaker 1: were hostages being held by another country and there wasn't
Speaker 1: anything we could do about it. That was a real
Speaker 1: blemish on the presidency. It was not a very proud
Speaker 1: thing to think about for America. But that was a
Speaker 1: reality for a while there.
Speaker 2: Yeah, so we ran at the time. This is the
Speaker 2: early eighties. This is just a few years removed from
Speaker 2: the Iranian Revolution of nineteen seventy nine, and this is
Speaker 2: where we talked about it before. Go look up photos
Speaker 2: of Iran in the mid seventies pre revolution, right, and
Speaker 2: it looks like London in the swinging sixties and seventies. Yeah,
Speaker 2: very kind of hit place to be. Iranian revolution happens.
Speaker 2: Fundamentalists take control of the government that was previously the
Speaker 2: Shaw of Iran, who was friendly to the West, sure,
Speaker 2: friendly to America generally, and the Iatola Komeni.
Speaker 1: Kohmani I've always heard Kohmane.
Speaker 2: Kohmani installed the Islamic theocracy and bad things started happening
Speaker 2: pretty quickly.
Speaker 1: But yeah, there was a It was about as quick
Speaker 1: a turn about face politically and socially as you could imagine.
Speaker 2: Yeah, for a whole country, yeah, yeah, but not everyone
Speaker 2: in the country, as we'll learn, Like the whole country
Speaker 2: didn't just change overnight.
Speaker 1: No, but the the Islamic theocracy was in power, sure,
Speaker 1: very much. So. One of the things that happened was
Speaker 1: they were not very fond of America or Americans, and
Speaker 1: the American embassy was famously stormed and sixty six Americans
Speaker 1: working there were taken hostage and held for more than
Speaker 1: a year.
Speaker 2: Man. That was like, this is stuff I really remember.
Speaker 1: Like four hundred and forty days or.
Speaker 2: Something, four hundred and forty four days, man, the Iranian
Speaker 2: hostage crisis. I remember this as a nine year old
Speaker 2: very clearly.
Speaker 1: Really, Oh yeah, I have no recollection.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it was a big deal, yellow ribbons, and it
Speaker 2: was on the news constantly.
Speaker 1: I remember entering the room and being like, what does
Speaker 1: this have to do with Rainbow Bright turn this newscast?
Speaker 2: I even remember. So what happened was Jimmy Carter did
Speaker 2: not get these hostages free during his his I was
Speaker 2: about to say rain, but that was sort of the
Speaker 2: opposite Jimmy Carter was during his administration is iron fisted rain.
Speaker 1: The days of terror.
Speaker 2: But within a few days, and that may have cast
Speaker 2: some election, but within a few days of our hours,
Speaker 2: even of Reagan's inauguration, the hostages were freed, and I
Speaker 2: remember as a nine year old hearing kids parroting their parents'
Speaker 2: conversations like it was really Carter that had him freed
Speaker 2: all the work he did up until then, and then
Speaker 2: other kids saying, are you kidding me? As soon as
Speaker 2: Reagan got in a office, they knew that they were
Speaker 2: toast and that Reagan wasn't going to be a patsy
Speaker 2: like Carter. And I was like, what's a patsy? Who
Speaker 2: are these dudes? No, but I remember very distinctly, it's weird,
Speaker 2: like on the playground hearing the stuff that's funny, Yeah,
Speaker 2: like a little nine year olds.
Speaker 1: I definitely didn't hear this when I was a kid,
Speaker 1: but I remember hearing later on as a grown up,
Speaker 1: still in the rainbow bright, that it was Reagan's campaign
Speaker 1: was somehow in touch with aaran yeah, and that they brokeered.
Speaker 1: This also got them to wait to release the hostages
Speaker 1: until after Reagan was in office. Well, the timing was not.
Speaker 2: At all hours after his inauguration. There's no accident.
Speaker 1: It's a little fishy, you know what I mean. But
Speaker 1: whether it was that's funny, I'm sure somebody's parents were like, yeah,
Speaker 1: it's because they were so scared of Reagan, they knew
Speaker 1: that they better release these guys. That's totally not the
Speaker 1: case because there were other hostages taken by other by
Speaker 1: actual Lebanese terrorists who were probably sponsored by Iran, and
Speaker 1: that were they were held throughout Reagan's presidency.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and that's sort of a big part of this.
Speaker 2: The second half of the story was the fact that
Speaker 2: that was very embarrassing for Reagan. He didn't like hostages
Speaker 2: being held on his watch.
Speaker 1: No, but he had campaigned against negotiating with terrorists under
Speaker 1: any circumstances. So he's stuck now, Yeah, because he's basically saying,
Speaker 1: if you get taken hostage, I mean, you're on your own. Well,
Speaker 1: we'll use our rhetoric and whatever we can to influence
Speaker 1: you being released, but we're not going to negotiate for
Speaker 1: your release. That's just the way it is.
Speaker 2: And that's a longstanding American policy, right, and it makes
Speaker 2: sense because if you negotiate with terrorists, then that's just
Speaker 2: going to need to more kidnappings. Yeah, because they know
Speaker 2: that you're open for business.
Speaker 1: Like anywhere in the world. Yeah, there was a kidnapping
Speaker 1: of twa Flight eight forty seven, very very famous one,
Speaker 1: you know, the picture of like the pilot leaning out
Speaker 1: of the cop sure and the guys in the picture
Speaker 1: with the gun behind him. That was eight forty seven, right,
Speaker 1: And that was I mean, that was I remember that
Speaker 1: one that was That was probably nine then, and that
Speaker 1: was just scary because they were flying all over the place.
Speaker 1: You had no idea what was going to happen. People
Speaker 1: were being beaten on the plane. When Navy guy was
Speaker 1: beaten in shot and throw his body thrown out on
Speaker 1: the tarmac.
Speaker 2: Yeah. The eighties, like it seems comparatively tame now in
Speaker 2: a lot of way as compared to the things that
Speaker 2: used to go on. Tank McDonald's hi jackings and kidnappings
Speaker 2: and hostages. It's like it was the eighties were nuts.
Speaker 1: They were nuts.
Speaker 2: But pac Man, right, you know, pac Man fevers, pac
Speaker 2: Man rapping Rodney it was crazy.
Speaker 1: Right, rapping Like is that Rodney Piper.
Speaker 2: No rapping Rodney Dangerfield his big hit?
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, yeah, no respect. What about what about the
Speaker 1: Ichy Shuffle? That was a little crazy?
Speaker 2: Was that eighties?
Speaker 1: Sure? Late eighties, I guess so, okay, I got one
Speaker 1: for you.
Speaker 2: Okay.
Speaker 1: The Bears, what was their thing?
Speaker 2: Oh? The Super Bowl Shuffle?
Speaker 1: Super Bowl Shuffle right, Yeah, that was pretty eighties. I
Speaker 1: think they were eighty four.
Speaker 2: Yeah, we're putting you know, my band every year plays
Speaker 2: for sure one gig at Decatur's Porch Best, and every
Speaker 2: year we try to do a theme, and this year
Speaker 2: we're doing eighties sort of new wave. Nice and I
Speaker 2: jokingly suggested pac Man Fever the Raping Rodney.
Speaker 1: But oh, you guys gonna do it?
Speaker 2: No, those songs are terrible.
Speaker 1: Do you have a synth player playing with you?
Speaker 2: I bought Emily a keyboard and she's learning.
Speaker 1: Awesome. Yeah, she's gonna be like wait, hold on, huh,
Speaker 1: that's cool man.
Speaker 2: Now she's practicing.
Speaker 1: I've heard her do that, and.
Speaker 2: She played piano when she was a kid, so it's
Speaker 2: not the biggest stretch.
Speaker 1: I've heard that one that her do. That one Blondie
Speaker 1: song that she just brought the house to.
Speaker 2: Yeah, we might one way or another. Yes, we might
Speaker 2: bring that back because that's eighties. Yeah, or was that?
Speaker 1: It was so close on the custom I seriously doubt
Speaker 1: anybody's going to throw a beer can at you for it.
Speaker 2: Anyway, Porch Best, everyone, I'll publicize it in October. Nice,
Speaker 2: So Reagan's hands are tied in every way possible because
Speaker 2: he can't on he can't negotiate with Terris. The only
Speaker 2: option is to send in a covert Delta Force.
Speaker 1: Team, which they Carter tried that, and yeah, work.
Speaker 2: Doesn't always work. You could lose your own men. And
Speaker 2: I think that's what happened in Carter's case, right, yeah. Sure,
Speaker 2: So what he can do though, without anyone knowing, is
Speaker 2: totally negotiate with Terras.
Speaker 1: Yeah, just as long as the American public doesn't no, sure, yeah,
Speaker 1: And that's what happened. And he followed that Reagan playbook
Speaker 1: where it's like, okay, I said this, well, if I
Speaker 1: just changed this one little part, right, it makes it
Speaker 1: all fine. That's right, again, as long as the American
Speaker 1: public doesn't know. So while Reagan said America will never
Speaker 1: negotiate with with hostages, they didn't say Israel will never
Speaker 1: nego terrorists for hostages, right, Yeah, So actually Israel had
Speaker 1: a long standing policy of negotiating with terrorists. They would
Speaker 1: they would kidnap people from the other side, and then
Speaker 1: they'd be like, all right, i'll give you five guys.
Speaker 1: I've only got two. Let me kidnap a few people, Okay, Now,
Speaker 1: I have five like there would be negotiations for hostage
Speaker 1: exchanges all the time between Israel and Palestine. Right, They
Speaker 1: just knew what they were doing. So they said, okay, well,
Speaker 1: if Israel goes to Iran and says, hey, you know
Speaker 1: this American over there, why don't you get them released.
Speaker 1: We can help you out with some stuff. What do
Speaker 1: you think about this?
Speaker 2: Yeah, So earlier when I mentioned the fact that Iran
Speaker 2: as whole cloth did not change overnight as a country.
Speaker 2: The government did, but there were still some plenty of
Speaker 2: people there that were a little more moderate in their views,
Speaker 2: and the Reagan administration had a channel to them. So
Speaker 2: he was talking to them, these more moderate factions and
Speaker 2: making a little headway. And they were like, by the way,
Speaker 2: we'll totally give you these hostages if you give us arms.
Speaker 1: Yeah, because Iran was fighting the Iran Iraq War at
Speaker 1: least half of it.
Speaker 2: Yeah. And this is just where stuff is just totally crazy,
Speaker 2: because we were we were funding both sides.
Speaker 1: At the very least, we were advising both sides.
Speaker 2: Well, I mean we directly gave money. Oh yeah, no,
Speaker 2: you're right, We sold them weapons and we provided training
Speaker 2: and intelligence. Right, And this was this wasn't secret. This
Speaker 2: was like a real deal thing.
Speaker 1: We were publicly supporting Iraq, but then we were secretly
Speaker 1: arming Iran.
Speaker 2: Yeah. I think what they never proved beyond a doubt
Speaker 2: was that we went to Saddam Hussein and said, hey,
Speaker 2: why don't you go in there and overthrow Iran?
Speaker 1: Oh?
Speaker 2: Really yeah, that was never I don't think that was ever.
Speaker 2: There was a lot of circumstantial evidence that that was
Speaker 2: the case, but never, like the smoking gun, that we
Speaker 2: actually encouraged Saddam Hussein to do so. But it's just, man,
Speaker 2: when you look at how all this played out over
Speaker 2: the years, it's just maddening.
Speaker 1: Yeah, you know, yeah, it's a s show.
Speaker 2: Yeah. So Iraq and Iran are fighting, we're supplying both,
Speaker 2: playing both sides of the coin, right, uh, And we
Speaker 2: offered arms to Iran And who are you gonna call?
Speaker 1: Is real?
Speaker 2: Not ghostbusters?
Speaker 1: Oh Gorbanaphar?
Speaker 2: Well you're gonna call Ali North?
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, okay, yeah, I would have gotten there eventually. Yeah,
Speaker 1: because okay, so remember Oly North is this total novice
Speaker 1: when it comes to covert operations bymore. Yeah, yeah, he's
Speaker 1: been running the Nicaragua op for years now. Yeah, just
Speaker 1: doing a bang up job of it. So they're like, well, sure,
Speaker 1: we'll have him do this incredibly illegal, super sensitive arms
Speaker 1: sailed to Iran too, Why don't you come on over here,
Speaker 1: Ali and all. He said, well, okay, that's fine, but
Speaker 1: I need to go get the lay of the land.
Speaker 1: And he actually traveled to Iran with a fake passport
Speaker 1: under an assumed name William P. Good with a knee
Speaker 1: and when he went, it was it was dangerous enough
Speaker 1: that William Casey, supposedly Oliver North later testified, gave him
Speaker 1: cyanide pills so that he could take his own life
Speaker 1: rather than be tortured by the Iranians. If this were
Speaker 1: in fact like some sort of setup.
Speaker 2: Again right out of a movie, yeah.
Speaker 1: But Oliver North went to Iran with cyanide pills.
Speaker 2: And a fake passport Billy Good.
Speaker 1: Yeah, so everything went great, though it did. He didn't
Speaker 1: need the cyanide pills after all.
Speaker 2: He did not. He dealt with, like you mentioned earlier,
Speaker 2: this Iranian businessman named Gorbanifar. And this guy was ten
Speaker 2: shades of shady, so much so that the CIA wouldn't
Speaker 2: even deal with them now.
Speaker 1: They issued a burn notice on him in nineteen.
Speaker 2: Eighty three, which is I don't even know what that is.
Speaker 2: That means just TV he's dead to us.
Speaker 1: It's basically stay away, okay, it's putting him on blast
Speaker 1: to all the other intelligence agencies in the world.
Speaker 2: Gotcha PERSONA grade.
Speaker 1: I won't even deal with this guy. And so Alie
Speaker 1: North is like, yeah, I'll deal with this guy.
Speaker 2: All right. So with his help, Oliver North set up
Speaker 2: a deal where and it's so simple to look at, like, Israel,
Speaker 2: you give them your missiles and then we'll just replace
Speaker 2: those missiles for you with our missiles.
Speaker 1: Yep.
Speaker 2: So we're not given the missiles you are.
Speaker 1: And because no American explicitly said to Iran, hey, we're
Speaker 1: doing this so that you guys will get these hostages released,
Speaker 1: it wasn't in arms for hostages deal, and so Reagan's
Speaker 1: vowed and never negotiate with terrorists remained intact.
Speaker 2: That's right. Five hundred and eight tow tow missiles What
Speaker 2: does that stand for?
Speaker 1: Two blaunched optically tracked wireless guided missile, which is like
Speaker 1: it's like the tube launched. There's a tube and it
Speaker 1: can be mounted on the ground, mounted on a jeep.
Speaker 1: It's super portable. But they are they'll blow some stuff up.
Speaker 2: I think I've seen these you have. So five hundred
Speaker 2: and eight of these made it from Israel to Iran,
Speaker 2: and then in very short order, a couple of days later,
Speaker 2: one of the hostages, Benjamin we Are, minister who was
Speaker 2: held by Lebanes's Terrists for sixteen months, was released. So
Speaker 2: it worked.
Speaker 1: It did work, Azah. It was a big deal around
Speaker 1: the White House too, but they said, let's try it again,
Speaker 1: but this time it seems a little messy to get
Speaker 1: Israel involved. Let's just do this ourselves. Alie, you think
Speaker 1: you can handle this, and he said, sure, me and
Speaker 1: Gerbonifor have this. So rather than Israel giving arms to Iran,
Speaker 1: Richard Seacord got brought in, just like with Nicaragua. And
Speaker 1: again this isn't like years after Nicaragua. Nicaragua's at full
Speaker 1: bore in full swamp, but it's still going yet, and
Speaker 1: Olie North is running both operations simultaneously. And so the
Speaker 1: news setup was the Department of Defense would sell the
Speaker 1: CIA missiles for thirty seven hundred bucks a pop. The
Speaker 1: CIA would sell them to Richard Seacord at cost, and
Speaker 1: then Seacord would sell them to Garbaniphar for ten grand apiece,
Speaker 1: and then Gorbanifhar would go sell them to Iran for
Speaker 1: whatever he charged Iran. Can you imagine, I can't. I
Speaker 1: guarantee it was more than the ten grand. Yeah, and
Speaker 1: this happened multiple times over the course of a little
Speaker 1: over a year. America secretly transferred two thousand missiles and
Speaker 1: missile parts to Iran in eight shipments.
Speaker 2: Yeah. For the release of hostages.
Speaker 1: Yeah. Ultimately there were three hostages that got released out
Speaker 1: of seven that had been taken hostage total.
Speaker 2: Yeah, And didn't he say ultimately there were three more
Speaker 2: hostages taken, so they netted out at zero at zero.
Speaker 1: Yeah, So but that was the whole Iran operation.
Speaker 2: Yeah, but here's the deals. This price markup means that
Speaker 2: that shell company and those Swiss bank accounts were making
Speaker 2: a lot of money, and so much so that I
Speaker 2: think one of them had three million dollars made an
Speaker 2: interest alone. So at some point someone's like, hey, this
Speaker 2: is a money making operation. Now, why don't we tie
Speaker 2: a little bow on all this and use some of
Speaker 2: that money to fund the contrast, Because you guys are
Speaker 2: doing both of these things and you need money. Congress
Speaker 2: won't give it to you. Forget the fundraising omelets. We'll
Speaker 2: just use the money from these illegal arm sales to
Speaker 2: fund the Contras.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and that's exactly what happened. So to put in
Speaker 1: playing terms, America illegally and secretly sold missiles to Iran,
Speaker 1: used the proceeds from those missile sales to secretly and
Speaker 1: illegally fund the Contras to help them overthrow their government
Speaker 1: down in Nicaragua. That's what the Reagan administration did.
Speaker 2: That's right.
Speaker 1: That's why it's called Iran Contra. That's where they came together.
Speaker 1: There was a diversion of funds.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and the I think it was a by nineteen
Speaker 2: eighty six, Congress finally got back on board because of
Speaker 2: this drum beat from Reagan over the years of how
Speaker 2: much we need to really do this officially, And keep
Speaker 2: in mind, Congress still didn't know any of this is
Speaker 2: going on right secretly. And then Congress said, all right,
Speaker 2: we'll give you a hundred million dollars to aid this cause.
Speaker 1: And you're going to say, how take a dog.
Speaker 2: You would think that was the end of all the
Speaker 2: covert stuff.
Speaker 1: It wasn't, though, No, No, it's still continued on. But
Speaker 1: now it was legitimized and had even better funding. But
Speaker 1: that was not the end of the whole thing. Like
Speaker 1: everybody didn't just get to walk away and say that
Speaker 1: was close, because the whole thing started to come apart. Actually,
Speaker 1: and I say that we take an ad break and
Speaker 1: come back and talk about it. Great after this.
Speaker 3: Well, now we're on the road, driving in your truck.
Speaker 3: Want to learn a thing or two from Josh Amuck?
Speaker 1: Stuff you should know? Should all right? Okay, Chuck. So
Speaker 1: nineteen eighty six Congress is back on board. I think
Speaker 1: it's worth pointing out that that's exactly four years after
Speaker 1: the Democrats took control of the House in nineteen eighty two.
Speaker 1: So I wonder if the Republicans took control back in
Speaker 1: eighty six, and that's why the funding got turned back
Speaker 1: onto the Contress.
Speaker 2: Me solve this?
Speaker 1: I like to speculate instead, So this.
Speaker 2: All might have Who knows if this ever would have
Speaker 2: even been found out had it not been for the
Speaker 2: sharpshooting of a young Sandinistan soldier named Jose Fernando Canales
Speaker 2: Almann Nice in October fifth, nineteen eighty six. It was
Speaker 2: a cargo plane, as he won twenty three called the
Speaker 2: provider flying seventy Soviet Kalishnikovs, one hundred thousand rounds of AMMO,
Speaker 2: rocket grenades and other supplies. And this is one of
Speaker 2: those things where you said they would fly over and
Speaker 2: kick him out the back of the plane. Sure, this
Speaker 2: is one of those runs.
Speaker 1: Yeah. The problem with this particular run, though, is that
Speaker 1: they did this at twenty five hundred feet in broad daylight.
Speaker 2: They got a little lazy o tad bit or maybe cocky.
Speaker 1: I don't even know if it's that. I think it
Speaker 1: was more like this was just work. It was an
Speaker 1: everyday job by this time. They've been doing it for years. Yeah,
Speaker 1: you know, and the operation was just humming along so
Speaker 1: nicely that it was almost an autopilot.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: So yeah, they did this one supply drop on October fifth,
Speaker 1: nineteen eighty six, in broad daylight.
Speaker 2: And there were four crew aboard. William J. Cooper, Wallace
Speaker 2: buzz Sawyer, Freddy Vilchis, and a guy named Eugene Hassenfuss
Speaker 2: who and again this sliding doors thing. Hassenfuss is the
Speaker 2: only guy who had a parachute. He borrowed it from
Speaker 2: his brother, a skydiver, because you know, he thought it
Speaker 2: might be smart to take a parachute, right no one
Speaker 2: else had parachutes. Had he not had a parachute, this
Speaker 2: may have turned out differently.
Speaker 1: It may have. For sure he was the only one
Speaker 1: that survived this plane crash because he was the only
Speaker 1: one who borrowed the parachute from his brother and he
Speaker 1: jumped out, landed, made it safely into the jungle. And
Speaker 1: I think he actually survived and evaded the Sandinistas for
Speaker 1: maybe a day or something like that before he was captured.
Speaker 1: And when he was captured, they led him out of
Speaker 1: the jungle like with a rope around his neck, just
Speaker 1: about as big of a prisoner as you can imagine.
Speaker 1: Super publicized. There are billboards of him being led around
Speaker 1: by Santainistas and they started asking him questions and he
Speaker 1: was like, what do you want to know?
Speaker 2: He say, like a canary, He really did.
Speaker 1: He said, this is my tenth supply mission. I presume
Speaker 1: that the CIA is running this. I don't know, And
Speaker 1: he would know this would be something that he would
Speaker 1: he could legitimately guess at at least because he had
Speaker 1: actually worked on CIA air drops over Vietnam or Cambodia
Speaker 1: for Air America back in the Vietnam War.
Speaker 2: Yeah, but he wasn't like, like he sings like a
Speaker 2: canary because he's not very high up on the totem pole.
Speaker 2: Like his job was to get up there and shove
Speaker 2: this stuff out of the back of the plane, right
Speaker 2: for three grand a month.
Speaker 1: Right, He wasn't even a CIA operator. He's just a
Speaker 1: former Marine who had a background working with Air America
Speaker 1: years before. But by this time, by the time he
Speaker 1: joins on doing this for the Contras, he was like
Speaker 1: working as a construction worker part time in Wisconsin right home.
Speaker 1: So this is like pretty good money, I think. Yeah,
Speaker 1: he was getting seven grand in today's dollars a month
Speaker 1: for basically kicking AK forty seven crates out the back
Speaker 1: of a plane over Nicaragua.
Speaker 2: Yeah, so he's not the kind of guy that's going
Speaker 2: to take the fall right for anyone. So he's singing
Speaker 2: like a canary.
Speaker 1: Even if he had kept his mouth shut, it wouldn't
Speaker 1: have mattered what it sounds like.
Speaker 2: Right, Yeah, Because all the other guys, including Hassenfuss, had
Speaker 2: their wallets on the plane, They had all their employee
Speaker 2: ID cards and in fact, I don't even we mentioned
Speaker 2: in episode one the company that was set up to
Speaker 2: do these drops was set up called Southern Air Transport
Speaker 2: out of I guess Miami. So they all had their
Speaker 2: Southern Air Transport IT cards, which was the CIA front.
Speaker 1: Like everybody knew Southern Transport was a CIA front, so
Speaker 1: they might as well have had like CIA Junior badges
Speaker 1: or something right, or.
Speaker 2: Like Michael Keaton and out of Sight when he has
Speaker 2: the big FBI T shirt.
Speaker 1: I haven't seen that one?
Speaker 2: Oh, you haven't seen out of Sight? No? Is that
Speaker 2: the one where he's George Clooney and Jennifer Lopez.
Speaker 1: Is he a bad guy in it?
Speaker 2: No, he's a good guy, but he walks in. He
Speaker 2: plays Ray Nicolette who played same character, and Jackie Brown
Speaker 2: FBI guy. Okay, but it's funny because he walks in
Speaker 2: with an FBI T shirt on, and Dennis Farina as
Speaker 2: Jennifer Lopez's dad, and he's a former CUP and he goes, hey, Ray,
Speaker 2: let me ask it. He got one that says undercover.
Speaker 1: Dennis Farina man class ad.
Speaker 2: I mean he got to see out of Sight. That's
Speaker 2: a classic. All right, I'll check it out like one
Speaker 2: of the better men.
Speaker 1: I mean, I know the movie. You're talking about avoid
Speaker 1: it like the plague.
Speaker 2: It's so good, Okay, you would love it, all right,
Speaker 2: So Southern air Transport caa front. There's also a log
Speaker 2: book that connected this flight and all the other flights.
Speaker 2: And then Hassenfuss in his wallet had a business card
Speaker 2: to Robert w Owen, this is a big one who
Speaker 2: was working with Oliver North in Washington.
Speaker 1: Right, which so that provided a direct line between Oliver
Speaker 1: North and some guys who were kicking Kalashnikov's out of
Speaker 1: the back of a plane over Nicaragua. So that was
Speaker 1: a really big deal that when this guy got captured
Speaker 1: and you know, told the Santonistas as much as he knew,
Speaker 1: because the Sandinistas were like, attention, world, Yeah, listen to
Speaker 1: what we just found out. The CIA has totally been
Speaker 1: funding these Countra rebels who are trying to overthrow this
Speaker 1: sovereign government, and we think you guys should know about it.
Speaker 2: Yeah, And it was it wasn't like you could totally
Speaker 2: discount that even though it was from the Sandinistans like
Speaker 2: and the American media were like what I'm sure Congress
Speaker 2: was like wait a minute, right, this reeks of like
Speaker 2: something that had been happening that we tried to shut down.
Speaker 1: Yeah, because remember, even if the CIA was brief in Congress,
Speaker 1: it was either Bill Casey or Dewey Clarridge, and they
Speaker 1: were doing a really obtuse job of this keeping Congress
Speaker 1: at arms length. So anytime something like this came out,
Speaker 1: almost none of Congress knew the full extent of this,
Speaker 1: and it was always in flagrant violation of whatever Congress
Speaker 1: wanted or whatever Congress had agreed to.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and this wasn't like this was sort of the
Speaker 2: straw that broke it all open, or that broke the
Speaker 2: camel's back.
Speaker 1: Broke the camel's back wide open. Oh god, that's correct,
Speaker 1: or camel.
Speaker 2: Things have been unraveling for a bit. There was a
Speaker 2: party in nineteen eighty five in Virginia thrown thrown by
Speaker 2: Soldier of Fortune magazine. Can you imagine? No, what's that party?
Speaker 1: Like? I don't want to know, I can't imagine. I
Speaker 1: used to read Soldier of Fortune when I was in
Speaker 1: my ninja training as like a ten year old boy,
Speaker 1: and even then I was like this, this magazine makes
Speaker 1: my stomach hurt.
Speaker 2: And it's in nineteen eighty five, Like, can you imagine
Speaker 2: the amount of like blow being secretly done in the
Speaker 2: bathroom at that party.
Speaker 1: Sure, but also they were making snuff movies in the
Speaker 1: living room, and there's no telling what was going on.
Speaker 1: As a soldier of Fortune, we can tell you at
Speaker 1: the very least, there was a lot of boasting going
Speaker 1: on openly about this contra operation. And again this is
Speaker 1: the time when people don't know about this stuff.
Speaker 2: Yeah, but you know what happens is like you get
Speaker 2: enough people in enough years, and people start talking, people
Speaker 2: start bragging. Yeah, and all of a sudden, you have
Speaker 2: a couple of gen and Tonics at a Soldier of
Speaker 2: Fortune party. Sure, and you're like, hey, guess what, and
Speaker 2: that that's what happened.
Speaker 1: Somebody goes what yeah, there you go here it comes.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and they drop the you know, they drop the
Speaker 2: bomb that what's been going on. A concerned citizen hears this.
Speaker 2: I guess he must have been mistakenly invited the soldier.
Speaker 1: I don't know how that guy got invited, or they
Speaker 1: just happened to talk to the wrong guy or whatever,
Speaker 1: but probably that he was like, I am really fearful
Speaker 1: of my life for saying something about this, but I
Speaker 1: feel like somebody should know. So he went to a lawyer,
Speaker 1: a human rights lawyer named David Shean, and he said,
Speaker 1: you go tell everybody you put your life on the line.
Speaker 2: And he did. He submitted an affidavit to federal court,
Speaker 2: started doing interviews, talking to journalists, drumming up support. White
Speaker 2: House was like, we don't know what you're talking about.
Speaker 2: You're a crazy man, Like this is all made up.
Speaker 2: And finally it took a Lebanese newspaper, Al Shira, that
Speaker 2: reported on this deal, this arms for hostage deal, like
Speaker 2: in a legitimate newspaper.
Speaker 1: Right, so now both stories have been blown open. You've
Speaker 1: got Eugene Hassenfu was captured and the contra operation is
Speaker 1: blown open, and now Al Shira is reporting on the
Speaker 1: Iran arms for hostage deal. And really, crazily enough, these
Speaker 1: two separate arms of this one scandal came out within
Speaker 1: a month of each other, which is it's bizarre, but
Speaker 1: that's what happened. And now it was like there's it's
Speaker 1: on the table. The America media knows about it, Congress
Speaker 1: knows about it. Heads are about to roll.
Speaker 2: All right, we'll take our final break and we'll come
Speaker 2: back and talk about the aftermath of Iran condra.
Speaker 3: Well, now we're on the road, driving in your truck.
Speaker 3: I want to learn a thing or two from Josh.
Speaker 2: Chuck.
Speaker 3: It's stuff you should know, all right.
Speaker 1: All right, Chuck, you promised that after your math.
Speaker 2: Let's hear it, all right, So everything is exposed. Oliver
Speaker 2: North was no longer in business doing his thing.
Speaker 1: No, he shut down shop real quick, he.
Speaker 2: Did, but not before. Very famously, he and his very
Speaker 2: eighties haired secretary, Fawn Hall. I forgot. I looked at
Speaker 2: was like, Fawn Hall. I looked her up, and as
Speaker 2: soon as I saw it, I was like, right, yeah,
Speaker 2: Fawn Hall, sure you can forget that hair. She could
Speaker 2: barely walk through a door.
Speaker 1: No, it was ginormous, for sure.
Speaker 2: It's so great. I would be fearful around a shreddervour her,
Speaker 2: but she was not fearful at all. She and Oliver
Speaker 2: North spent a day they could. They call it a
Speaker 2: shredding party. I mean, we will never know the full
Speaker 2: truth behind this because of all the evidence that they shredded.
Speaker 1: Yep, as far as anyone knows, Oliver North decided on
Speaker 1: his own to shred every document he had on it.
Speaker 1: That's right, and yeah, that's that's it. It's it's now
Speaker 1: it's the official narrative that has been written into the
Speaker 1: history book, which you can just guarantee is not anywhere
Speaker 1: near the full story, right.
Speaker 2: So it all comes out. The Reagan administration start looking
Speaker 2: around and they're like, well, who who's going to be
Speaker 2: the patsy for this one? And Oliver North could not
Speaker 2: escape it, but they're like, he's small potatoes, he'll go down.
Speaker 1: Well, I think he was even willing to take the fall,
Speaker 1: like he knew he was going to be the fall
Speaker 1: guy and was like, okay, that's part of the job.
Speaker 2: Right, But they knew that it had to the American public,
Speaker 2: and certainly Congress wasn't going to be satisfied with just
Speaker 2: Oliver North, right, So who did they land on?
Speaker 1: So the official line became this Poindexter and I guess
Speaker 1: McFarlane would have started it. Became fully aware of just
Speaker 1: how badly Reagan wanted to help the Contras and said
Speaker 1: I'm going to do something about this, and tapped Allie
Speaker 1: North and said we need to help the Contras out.
Speaker 1: Go help him out, figure it out. And North went
Speaker 1: off and basically went rogue on his own and set
Speaker 1: up this whole operation, created this entire network with Seacord
Speaker 1: decided to do the Iranian arms deal all this stuff
Speaker 1: basically on his.
Speaker 2: Own, right, like Reagan and Bush knew nothing about.
Speaker 1: It, nothing about it, and that the buck stopped at Poindexter.
Speaker 1: Ultimately it didn't go any further. William Casey being CIA,
Speaker 1: he was basically out of the loop. That was the
Speaker 1: official story they came out with, right, and America when
Speaker 1: you're kidding, right, this is a joke.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean I remember these hearings even as a
Speaker 2: little kid, like watching these and then watching the news
Speaker 2: coverage of it, and like we mentioned all over North
Speaker 2: strolling in there with his dress uniform and you know,
Speaker 2: by all accounts being a pretty stand up guy, like
Speaker 2: he didn't rat anyone out.
Speaker 1: He didn't. But he also he was like, there's there's
Speaker 1: no way the president didn't know about this. He said,
Speaker 1: I don't have any direct evidence that the president did
Speaker 1: know about it, but it's my understanding that the president
Speaker 1: was fully aware of what was going on.
Speaker 2: Yeah, what was the deal with this missile supply shipment? Though,
Speaker 2: That's the one thing didn't quite get.
Speaker 1: So there was North got rid of all the documents
Speaker 1: that he could, right, well, North didn't have any control
Speaker 1: over CIA documents, and at that first missile resupply where
Speaker 1: they were resupplying Israel, he had a CIA. He basically said, Hey, CIA,
Speaker 1: do you know anybody I can use to ship these things.
Speaker 1: I've got an emergency here. I need to get these
Speaker 1: to Israel fast. And the CIA, being the CIA is
Speaker 1: still a bureaucracy, they had to document this event. So
Speaker 1: there was a document out there now and right that
Speaker 1: he couldn't get his hands on, that he couldn't shred.
Speaker 1: And so this led to Reagan taking responsibility for saying, okay,
Speaker 1: I was aware of this Iran missile deal by backdating
Speaker 1: an order to William Casey saying I order you not
Speaker 1: to tell Congress about this, even though you're supposed to.
Speaker 1: So Reagan basically said, on paper, I know about this Iran,
Speaker 1: this one missile transfer to Iran. Had no idea about
Speaker 1: the contrasts, right, okay. And at first they started off
Speaker 1: denying everything.
Speaker 2: Oh yeah, like after this, I'll share a story that
Speaker 2: we talked about. He went on television, Reagan did and
Speaker 2: denied everything.
Speaker 1: He said, all this is just total bs, yeah exactly.
Speaker 1: Now let's stop talking about it.
Speaker 2: Everybody ten days after that, Reagan had another press conference
Speaker 2: where he talked about the Iran operation and he acknowledged it,
Speaker 2: but said, what we're really doing here is just trying
Speaker 2: to sort of send a signal to Iran that where
Speaker 2: we want friendlier relations. Right, there were not arms for
Speaker 2: hostage exactly.
Speaker 1: And then so that was ten days after the first denial, right,
Speaker 1: and then four months after that, because the reporting would
Speaker 1: not stop, he basically said, Okay, yeah, whatever it started
Speaker 1: out as, I admit that it devolved into an arms
Speaker 1: for hostage deal. Which even that, even that admission, which
Speaker 1: is the closest he ever came to admitting, you know,
Speaker 1: responsibility for it. Yeah, even that's his total b us
Speaker 1: and fantasy. It was from the outset in arms for
Speaker 1: hostages deal. Right, The whole thing was set up to
Speaker 1: get hostages released, and that was it. So there was
Speaker 1: there was no other way to put it. Yeah, but
Speaker 1: that's he denied that to his dying day.
Speaker 2: As far as fallout, Poindexter resign Oliver North was fired,
Speaker 2: Casey died in a hospital not too long after this
Speaker 2: whole thing like was exposed, I mean like weeks. Yeah,
Speaker 2: so the press was all over the president. He appointed
Speaker 2: the Tower Commission. Yeah, the look into this.
Speaker 1: The president appointed a commission to investigate, Yeah, the president's
Speaker 1: own administration's wrongdoing.
Speaker 2: That's right. And it was determined that Reagan's disengagement from
Speaker 2: the management of his White House created condition conditions such
Speaker 2: that it was possible that he did not know about this.
Speaker 1: Which is the absolute best official finding he could have
Speaker 1: hoped for, because it basically says rang it didn't. He
Speaker 1: had a rogue guy working for him, a true believer,
Speaker 1: a patriot. But Reagan didn't know about this, and yeah,
Speaker 1: he should have. He should have had a closer watch
Speaker 1: on his executive branch, but he didn't. What are you
Speaker 1: going to do? Let's get mister t in here for
Speaker 1: a photo op with Nancy.
Speaker 2: There was a criminal investigation, and what they were really
Speaker 2: honing in on was the eighteen million dollars in profits
Speaker 2: that were made and what happened to that money where
Speaker 2: it went. Fourteen people were charged. Oliver North was tried
Speaker 2: and found guilty on three counts. One of the counts
Speaker 2: was for getting a sixteen thousand dollars security system installed
Speaker 2: in his home courtesy of Seacord. With that money.
Speaker 1: There was a rumor that there was a bounty on
Speaker 1: his head from terrorists, and she hooked him up. Right Now,
Speaker 1: that was a big problem for North, because North's whole
Speaker 1: bag was I was following orders that I assume we're
Speaker 1: coming from the president ultimately, and I was doing it
Speaker 1: out of my patriotic duty and a sense of, you know,
Speaker 1: as a true believer that we need to get rid
Speaker 1: of communism. And the American public loved it. They were like, great,
Speaker 1: make this man a saint. Congress started to love it too,
Speaker 1: and he got off. But that was a real problem
Speaker 1: because it's saying, well, you took this gift from funds
Speaker 1: from this illicit arms sales.
Speaker 2: Right, But it was a gift of a security system
Speaker 2: to help protect his family, So it's not like, you know,
Speaker 2: it was a gift of ten pounds a blow.
Speaker 1: And Nicaraguans sex worker from the Santa and Eastern government exactly.
Speaker 2: Seacord was convicted of one count of lying to Congress
Speaker 2: and the investigators. He basically denied that North received any
Speaker 2: funds from any of this. So it's still kind of
Speaker 2: hinged on that security system, I guess.
Speaker 1: And so everybody went to jail forever after that point.
Speaker 2: Right, No, that's not true at all. Hakeem got two
Speaker 2: years probation, a five thousand dollars fine.
Speaker 1: Secord got two years probation.
Speaker 2: Is that what he got? Two years probation.
Speaker 1: So the two guys who were actually running the company
Speaker 1: that ran this whole thing each got two years probation.
Speaker 2: North's conviction was overturned on a technicality, and President Bush,
Speaker 2: the senior Bush, on Christmas Eve, this was Christmas Eve
Speaker 2: as he was leaving office, right, yep, he issued six
Speaker 2: pardons basically let everyone off the hook, including Casper Weinberger
Speaker 2: who hadn't even gone to trial yet.
Speaker 1: No, and neither had Duyne Clarridge. Dewey Clarridge was going
Speaker 1: to stay on trial too. Both of them received preemptive pardons.
Speaker 1: And a lot of people are like, that was about
Speaker 1: the shadiest set of pardons anyone's ever issued, because there's
Speaker 1: a lot of people out there who say Bush really
Speaker 1: walked away from this scot free, But there is no
Speaker 1: way he wasn't even more involved in this than Reagan was.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean George Bush withheld subpoena his subpoena diary
Speaker 2: entries that basically indicated that he had full knowledge of
Speaker 2: this the entire time. Eventually, in nineteen ninety two, Independent
Speaker 2: Counselor Lawrence Walsh asked for these again, and Bush like said,
Speaker 2: I asked you for these diary entries. And Bush was like,
Speaker 2: I didn't you did. I didn't fully understand. It was inadvertent,
Speaker 2: like you asked me for a lot of stuff. I
Speaker 2: didn't know you asked me for the diary entries. And
Speaker 2: Walsh was really upset and he said, the Iran contra
Speaker 2: cover up has now been completed. And George Bush as
Speaker 2: a president who has such a contempt for honesty and
Speaker 2: arrogant disregard for the rule of law.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and I mean the forestalling that the Reagan White
Speaker 1: House and then later on the Bush White House did
Speaker 1: in allowing these investigations to go forward and trying to
Speaker 1: keep Congress at arm's length after everything came out. It
Speaker 1: worked because there were articles of impeachment introduced in the
Speaker 1: House against Ronald Reagan, and they managed to stave them
Speaker 1: off to where it was like, while he's leaving office, anyway,
Speaker 1: forget about it. This investigation took years and years and years,
Speaker 1: and then finally when Bush pardoned everybody that was it,
Speaker 1: there was nothing else to do. Everybody who was involved
Speaker 1: was implication was off Scott free. And then the fact
Speaker 1: that Oliver North had shredded all those documents, they were
Speaker 1: all lost to history, like the actual truth is lost
Speaker 1: to history.
Speaker 2: Yeah. Reagan, his reputation took a hit, a temporary hit
Speaker 2: for a while there. He went from sixty three percent
Speaker 2: in the span of a couple of months to forty
Speaker 2: three to forty seven percent depending on which poe you
Speaker 2: looked at on his approval rating. And he would get
Speaker 2: it back though, despite in the nineteen ninety deposition, the
Speaker 2: very very famous deposition where Ronald Reagan said I don't
Speaker 2: remember or I don't recall eighty eight times. That was
Speaker 2: very big deal. It was all over the news. Yeah,
Speaker 2: it was almost as famous, or just as famous as
Speaker 2: Bill Clinton's very famous. It depends what your definition of
Speaker 2: is is right exactly, But Reagan bounded.
Speaker 1: He did, man to the most popular presidency since FDR. Right.
Speaker 2: Yeah. Upon his exit, his approval rating had bounced all
Speaker 2: the way back up to the early sixties.
Speaker 1: Mister t famously carried him out of the White House
Speaker 1: on his shoulders on his last day in office. Oh man,
Speaker 1: so that's a wrong Contra. Man, what a story. Heck
Speaker 1: of a story. Where's this movie? I don't know. Hopefully
Speaker 1: we'll get some rights to it after this episode.
Speaker 2: I want to play Fawn Hall.
Speaker 1: Welso that's great.
Speaker 2: You get Jerry to play Fawn Hall.
Speaker 1: That'd be great. Jerry Well. In the meantime, while we
Speaker 1: find a suitable wig for Jerry, you can find out
Speaker 1: more about Iran Contra by going and reading contemporary articles
Speaker 1: on it. I'm telling you it's really awesome. And since
Speaker 1: I said that it's time for listener mail, I'm.
Speaker 2: Gonna call this follow up on the moonlanding thing. Hey, guys,
Speaker 2: in my opinion, the Apollo missions and moonlandings are the
Speaker 2: most significant events in the history of life on Earth.
Speaker 2: On the question why the Command Module and Lunar Lander
Speaker 2: were launched separated, I think the reason was to allow
Speaker 2: the Command Module to be ejected in case of an emergency.
Speaker 2: The very top of the Apollo stack was the launch
Speaker 2: escape system, like an ejector seat on steroids. I imagine
Speaker 2: they had to keep things as light and nimble as
Speaker 2: possible for the l S to be effective. I don't
Speaker 2: think you mentioned something that's really significant. The Apollo eight
Speaker 2: mission was the very first time humans went to the Moon.
Speaker 2: On top of being the first time we broke free
Speaker 2: of Earth's gravity. Like eleven, the stakes were incredibly high.
Speaker 2: They had to first insert the correct trajectory to make
Speaker 2: it to the Moon, then do a burn to enter
Speaker 2: the orbit around the Moon, then perform another burn to
Speaker 2: break free of the Moon's gravity and head back toward Earth.
Speaker 2: If any piece was not in place, those astronauts would
Speaker 2: have spent the rest of their lives either orbiting the
Speaker 2: Sun or orbiting the Moon. Apollo eight also gave us
Speaker 2: the Earth Rise photo.
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, yeah, I've been hearing a lot about Apollo
Speaker 1: eight lately too, So this person is hats off to you.
Speaker 2: Level was on both Apollo eight and Apollo thirteen. You
Speaker 2: travel to the Moon twice but never had the opportunity
Speaker 2: to land.
Speaker 1: That is so sad.
Speaker 2: Signed a space geek Noah Alloi.
Speaker 1: Nice work, Noah Alloi Alloi LOOI great name too. Thanks
Speaker 1: a lot for getting in touch with us. We love
Speaker 1: space geeks. We love to put you guys in headlocks
Speaker 1: and rub your heads with our knuckles until you go stop.
Speaker 2: It's called a noggie right here on Earth.
Speaker 1: That's right. If you want a noggy from me and Chuck,
Speaker 1: send us a space geeky or any kind of geeky thing.
Speaker 1: We love that kind of stuff. If you can go
Speaker 1: on to stuff youshould know dot com and follow our
Speaker 1: social links and you can send us a good old
Speaker 1: fashioned email, wrap it up, spank it on the bottom,
Speaker 1: and send it off to stuff Podcasts at iHeartRadio dot com.
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