WEBVTT - The Smoking Gun 0:00:00.680 --> 0:00:05.400 This is a production of Journalista Podcast LLC and iHeartRadio. 0:00:36.479 --> 0:00:41.880 Welcome back to the Journalista Podcast. Well, the smoking gun 0:00:41.960 --> 0:00:44.360 everyone's been looking for has just been shot down by 0:00:44.360 --> 0:00:47.800 a shoulder mounted missile, and every journalist in the Western 0:00:47.840 --> 0:00:58.240 hemisphere is after that story. So let's talk about the 0:00:58.280 --> 0:01:01.320 biggest story of the eighties, the one that sort of 0:01:01.320 --> 0:01:02.200 defines your career. 0:01:03.000 --> 0:01:06.120 Well, I would have to say it was the Hasenfu story. 0:01:06.760 --> 0:01:10.720 For those that don't know the background, we'd been covering 0:01:10.760 --> 0:01:15.480 this war for a decade maybe less, the Sandinistas always 0:01:15.520 --> 0:01:19.800 maintaining that it was the US financing the contras that 0:01:19.880 --> 0:01:24.800 were attacking Nicaragua and the Sandinistas and the civilians and 0:01:24.840 --> 0:01:29.080 everybody there, but there had never been any concrete proof. 0:01:29.800 --> 0:01:33.959 So for you guys, the journalists on the ground, everybody 0:01:34.000 --> 0:01:35.800 knows this is happening, they just can't prove it. 0:01:35.840 --> 0:01:38.760 We all know, just like the Sandinistas know, just like 0:01:38.959 --> 0:01:42.200 everybody knows, that the US is involved, but there was 0:01:42.240 --> 0:01:43.760 never any concrete proof. 0:01:43.880 --> 0:01:47.000 So the worst kept secret in Nicaragua, worst kept secret. 0:01:47.240 --> 0:01:51.240 But also all the journalists and of course all the 0:01:51.240 --> 0:01:55.720 Sandinistas wanted to get this proof to say, hey, we 0:01:55.880 --> 0:02:01.240 told you so one day I'm in Miami vacation, took 0:02:01.280 --> 0:02:05.000 my son Chico. I'm on vacation, but I'm still hanging 0:02:05.040 --> 0:02:07.640 out at the CBS bureau. It's like we can't get 0:02:07.680 --> 0:02:10.840 away from it, you know. So I believe it was 0:02:10.880 --> 0:02:14.399 a Thursday. I'm not sure Wednesday or Thursday. I get 0:02:14.440 --> 0:02:18.359 a call from someone in nicarag was saying, have you heard. 0:02:19.000 --> 0:02:23.440 That someone was Cookie's assistant Alejandro Belly aka Chilean. 0:02:23.960 --> 0:02:27.320 The day that Casimphus came down, I was in the office. 0:02:27.400 --> 0:02:28.200 Cookie wasn't. 0:02:28.520 --> 0:02:30.920 I got the phone call, and we were the first 0:02:31.080 --> 0:02:34.080 service that got the phone call. It was the Ministry 0:02:34.120 --> 0:02:36.000 of Defense and the Army. 0:02:36.240 --> 0:02:37.239 We knew very well. 0:02:37.360 --> 0:02:40.639 Rosa Plastos, who was in chargeable doing relationes Pulicas de 0:02:40.720 --> 0:02:44.040 l Hersito. Her office would call in asking for Cookie. 0:02:44.080 --> 0:02:47.000 Cooky wasn't there. So they know me, and they say, 0:02:47.080 --> 0:02:49.600 you know, we're organizing a pool of the networks. We 0:02:49.600 --> 0:02:53.040 cannot take everyone. We're asking you to lead it. But 0:02:53.200 --> 0:02:57.320 that is her connection. They trusted her, I feel, and 0:02:57.440 --> 0:02:59.760 of course she had better connections. Of course she would 0:03:00.000 --> 0:03:02.240 shmush mush, Daniella when she would be there. 0:03:02.400 --> 0:03:06.880 You know, the Sandinistas have proof now that the US 0:03:07.000 --> 0:03:10.680 is involved because they caught an American associated with the 0:03:10.720 --> 0:03:16.160 CIA kicking out supplies over Contra territory. 0:03:16.000 --> 0:03:18.799 From a plane. Correct, So basically, the back ass of 0:03:18.840 --> 0:03:21.119 the plane is open and he's kicking out the kicking. 0:03:20.960 --> 0:03:24.440 This was this guy's specialty. He kicked out supplies. He 0:03:24.560 --> 0:03:29.440 kicked out propaganda over Sandinista territory because you want to 0:03:29.480 --> 0:03:34.320 win over the Sandinistas. But he also kicked out supplies. 0:03:33.800 --> 0:03:37.240 For the Contras. The plane gets shot down. 0:03:37.760 --> 0:03:42.120 The pilot and another person on the flight didn't have parachutes, 0:03:42.360 --> 0:03:46.200 but this guy, Eugene hazard Fus, for some reason, made 0:03:46.240 --> 0:03:49.640 the decision before he left to wear a parachute, which 0:03:49.840 --> 0:03:53.400 saved his life. So when the plane gets shot down, 0:03:53.480 --> 0:03:57.440 it crashes, the pilot and the other guy were killed instantly. 0:03:57.800 --> 0:04:04.400 Hazard Fus parachuted into Sandinista territory. This poor guy, he's 0:04:04.440 --> 0:04:07.680 the low man on the totopole, you know, a grunt, 0:04:08.160 --> 0:04:13.000 a kicker, which wasn't a very big important. 0:04:12.480 --> 0:04:15.119 Job, certainly not glamorous. 0:04:14.760 --> 0:04:15.680 Not glamorous. 0:04:16.080 --> 0:04:20.080 He survives because of the parachute, but he is convinced 0:04:20.080 --> 0:04:22.799 that as soon as he's caught, he will be shot 0:04:22.920 --> 0:04:26.440 on site, so he's hiding in some shack. Of course, 0:04:26.480 --> 0:04:29.960 the Sandinistas come upon him. He's still convinced they're going 0:04:30.000 --> 0:04:33.680 to kill him, and they don't because they also knew 0:04:33.680 --> 0:04:36.960 what they had. This was the first time that these 0:04:37.000 --> 0:04:40.400 guys are going to be able to prove prove positive 0:04:40.800 --> 0:04:44.880 with the human being that the US was involved in 0:04:44.960 --> 0:04:45.360 the war. 0:04:46.440 --> 0:04:49.000 You may have seen the iconic photo of Hasenfus being 0:04:49.080 --> 0:04:53.640 let out of the jungle by Sandinistas. Lou Demataeus tells 0:04:53.720 --> 0:04:54.520 us how it came to be. 0:04:55.920 --> 0:04:59.159 So we're flying in. Of course it's out in the jungle. 0:04:59.640 --> 0:05:02.760 The hell copter's got a land at the highest point 0:05:03.200 --> 0:05:06.240 to be like a hilltop that's been cleared by the 0:05:06.360 --> 0:05:09.480 army guys, so the helicopter could land. As we're coming in, 0:05:09.839 --> 0:05:12.919 I can see down by the river some activity, and 0:05:13.000 --> 0:05:16.480 I saw a really tall guy, and there were some 0:05:16.800 --> 0:05:20.440 shorter guys and farmy fatigues, and so I thought, well, 0:05:20.680 --> 0:05:21.280 that's that. 0:05:21.360 --> 0:05:22.120 Must be the guy. 0:05:22.839 --> 0:05:26.159 So we're getting off the helicopter and the har Republic 0:05:26.200 --> 0:05:29.400 Relation guys are going we want to have a press conference. 0:05:29.440 --> 0:05:31.719 Everybody over here. We're going to have a press conference. 0:05:31.880 --> 0:05:34.400 But I mean, as I was flying in, I saw 0:05:34.480 --> 0:05:37.400 that destroyed plane and I saw it and I saw 0:05:37.440 --> 0:05:41.400 the tail section of fuselage, and I saw some soldiers 0:05:41.440 --> 0:05:43.640 over there, and I said, well, what am I going 0:05:43.680 --> 0:05:45.400 to be going to wait in the press conference? 0:05:45.600 --> 0:05:47.720 Or am I going to go get photographs? 0:05:48.760 --> 0:05:51.960 And I remember I was running towards where I had 0:05:52.040 --> 0:05:55.920 seen the plane, and I saw these boots, all these 0:05:56.040 --> 0:05:58.120 army boots, and I remember thinking, what. 0:05:58.040 --> 0:05:59.800 Are all these army boots doing. 0:06:00.480 --> 0:06:03.480 It's very strange, And of course I realized later as 0:06:03.560 --> 0:06:06.479 it was the Contra supply plane, and that was part 0:06:06.520 --> 0:06:10.240 of what they were supplying, these guys with arms and munitions, 0:06:10.279 --> 0:06:13.800 but also you know, things like army boots. I got 0:06:13.839 --> 0:06:17.040 to where the tail section was and a big part 0:06:17.080 --> 0:06:20.360 of the plane they were pulling rifles out, and then 0:06:20.400 --> 0:06:22.640 there was a guy on the tail section and he 0:06:22.839 --> 0:06:26.800 was sort of guarding with this AK forty seven. So 0:06:26.880 --> 0:06:30.279 I saw this tarp over these bodies and I could 0:06:30.360 --> 0:06:33.080 see like boots sticking out from the tarp. 0:06:33.520 --> 0:06:35.600 Those are guys who didn't make it. 0:06:35.760 --> 0:06:38.760 I took the pictures of the tarp, you know, with 0:06:38.839 --> 0:06:42.479 the boots sticking out, and I took some other stuff 0:06:42.600 --> 0:06:44.599 as soon as I got back and there was a 0:06:44.640 --> 0:06:47.560 whole line of you know, probably three TV. 0:06:47.440 --> 0:06:49.920 Crews, and there were a bunch of photographers. 0:06:50.120 --> 0:06:52.800 But then we saw from down where the river was, 0:06:53.080 --> 0:06:56.240 which was a low point, we saw them bringing Hassimpus 0:06:56.360 --> 0:06:59.040 up the hill to where the hill copters were. They 0:06:59.080 --> 0:07:02.480 had his hands tied and then they were leading him, 0:07:02.960 --> 0:07:04.839 and so I just started photographing. 0:07:07.080 --> 0:07:10.520 Low's photograph became a synonymous with the Iron Contra affair, 0:07:10.640 --> 0:07:12.600 as the one with Oliver North standing in front of 0:07:12.640 --> 0:07:16.080 Congress with his hand in the air. This moment was 0:07:16.120 --> 0:07:19.520 the beginning of the unraveling of the Reagan administration's illegal 0:07:19.560 --> 0:07:22.160 operation to fund and supply the contrasts. 0:07:22.800 --> 0:07:25.720 It turns out the guy who was in front bringing 0:07:25.760 --> 0:07:28.040 him up the hill, which you see in that photograph, 0:07:28.040 --> 0:07:31.720 he is actually the one who fired the shoulder mounted 0:07:31.960 --> 0:07:35.040 a missile, the sam that hit the plane. He was 0:07:35.120 --> 0:07:40.640 being rewarded for this incredible heat. They brought him up. 0:07:41.120 --> 0:07:44.320 They let John ask a couple of questions. 0:07:45.360 --> 0:07:49.360 That's John Seisloff, the CBS producer you've met in earlier episodes, 0:07:49.400 --> 0:07:52.280 like when Cookie was busted for having some weed, you know, 0:07:52.760 --> 0:07:56.120 the Quaker. The first question was, can you tell us 0:07:56.160 --> 0:07:56.560 your name? 0:07:57.760 --> 0:08:03.400 My name is Jeane Hausen plus Barnett, Wisconsin. 0:08:04.920 --> 0:08:06.360 If you tell a name. 0:08:09.000 --> 0:08:12.400 Shot out of the sky. He didn't know what they 0:08:12.440 --> 0:08:13.360 were going to do to him. 0:08:13.880 --> 0:08:16.400 When you see the the Conic photo, if you look 0:08:16.440 --> 0:08:19.280 at him, he looks really worried because he thought there's 0:08:19.320 --> 0:08:21.200 a good chance they were just gonna plow him away. 0:08:22.200 --> 0:08:26.720 But when he saw the journalists, then he like relaxed. 0:08:27.000 --> 0:08:29.520 I'm sure he thought, well, I guess they're not gonna 0:08:29.600 --> 0:08:31.440 kill me. Is they gonna make it out of here? 0:08:31.760 --> 0:08:35.520 Because they're not gonna shoot me in front of these journalists. Yeah, 0:08:35.679 --> 0:08:38.720 it's told demeanor changed. And then like I said, I mean, 0:08:39.160 --> 0:08:41.520 it was his moment. I mean, it's a great line. 0:08:42.160 --> 0:08:44.720 He said, I got shot out of the sky. I mean, 0:08:44.880 --> 0:08:47.520 you know, it was almost like a movie moment, but 0:08:47.640 --> 0:08:49.000 it wasn't. It was reality. 0:08:50.240 --> 0:08:53.280 The Washington Post wrote this about the historic moment. 0:08:53.679 --> 0:08:57.920 Captured American put on display by Nicaragua. Eugene Haussenfuss, an 0:08:57.920 --> 0:09:01.959 American captured by Nicaraguan troops, appeared briefly at a press 0:09:02.000 --> 0:09:06.240 conference here late today, and the Sandinista military displayed credentials 0:09:06.360 --> 0:09:09.719 identifying him and the American co pilot who died in 0:09:09.800 --> 0:09:13.920 a downed plain Sunday, as US military advisors in El Salvador. 0:09:14.520 --> 0:09:17.920 A second American the pilot, also was killed, according to 0:09:18.000 --> 0:09:22.040 Nicaragua officials. The Nicaraguan government charged that the flight was 0:09:22.120 --> 0:09:26.080 operated by the CIA to resupply US backed rebels known 0:09:26.240 --> 0:09:31.080 as Contras inside Nicaragua. Osinphus is the first American prisoner 0:09:31.120 --> 0:09:33.920 of war the leftist Sandinista government is known to have 0:09:34.040 --> 0:09:37.040 captured in five years of fighting against the Contras. 0:09:38.600 --> 0:09:42.880 The Sandinista army commander who captured Hazenfus was Lieutenant Colonel 0:09:43.200 --> 0:09:46.959 Roberto Calderon. If that name sounds familiar, he was the 0:09:47.000 --> 0:09:50.520 guy that rescued Cookie after the helicopter crash. He said 0:09:50.559 --> 0:09:53.880 they recovered seventy new Soviet made assault rifles, one hundred 0:09:53.960 --> 0:09:57.599 thousand rounds of ammunition, a dozen PG seven rockets, and 0:09:57.640 --> 0:10:00.040 one hundred and fifty pairs of boots. The flo I 0:10:00.120 --> 0:10:03.520 had originated from a base in El Salvador. The US 0:10:03.559 --> 0:10:07.359 Embassy in El Salvador immediately released a statement saying Hasenfus 0:10:07.480 --> 0:10:09.959 is not part of the US military group here. We 0:10:10.080 --> 0:10:12.880 don't know who he is. The Embassy in Monagua said 0:10:13.160 --> 0:10:16.320 neither the airplane, nor its crew and cargo were financed 0:10:16.360 --> 0:10:20.520 by the US government. Hasenfus's wife, Sally, reached out for help. 0:10:21.520 --> 0:10:27.640 The next morning, I tried to call President Reagan. I thought, well, 0:10:27.679 --> 0:10:29.640 it's the only place I'm going to get answers. He's 0:10:30.880 --> 0:10:33.160 you know, I should be able to trust him. He's 0:10:33.200 --> 0:10:35.200 the president. I knew. 0:10:35.240 --> 0:10:35.600 He knew. 0:10:36.800 --> 0:10:38.920 He put me in touch with a man named Elliot Abrams. 0:10:39.840 --> 0:10:41.160 He said, I don't know who you are, and I 0:10:41.200 --> 0:10:44.280 don't know what you're talking about. I got angry, and 0:10:44.360 --> 0:10:46.840 before I hung up, he did admit that he knew 0:10:46.840 --> 0:10:49.559 what I was talking about, and he kept warning me that, 0:10:49.760 --> 0:10:52.120 you know, be careful of the press, and you know, 0:10:52.240 --> 0:10:53.959 be careful what you say, be careful what you do. 0:10:55.240 --> 0:10:58.680 Elliott Abrams was the Assistant Secretary of State. What Sally 0:10:58.800 --> 0:11:01.280 didn't know was that he was secretly involved in the 0:11:01.320 --> 0:11:04.160 whole contrast scheme. In other words, part of the problem, 0:11:04.760 --> 0:11:08.240 not the solution. You know, it's the biggest story of 0:11:08.320 --> 0:11:08.800 the decade. 0:11:09.080 --> 0:11:11.599 I know it's going to be the biggest story of 0:11:11.679 --> 0:11:12.280 the decade. 0:11:12.880 --> 0:11:16.560 And you also know that every journalist in the world, 0:11:16.880 --> 0:11:19.720 certainly in Nicaragua and all the Western journalists covering. 0:11:19.520 --> 0:11:21.680 It that was there and that I knew we're going 0:11:21.760 --> 0:11:22.439 to be flying in. 0:11:23.000 --> 0:11:27.400 Everybody wanted that. Everybody knew what it was, everyone knew 0:11:27.400 --> 0:11:28.520 what the consequences were. 0:11:28.640 --> 0:11:32.400 Of course, the first time it proof positive us has evolved. 0:11:33.080 --> 0:11:36.360 George Bosa, soundman for the CBS Dream Team, was a 0:11:36.400 --> 0:11:37.360 witness to the mayhem. 0:11:38.600 --> 0:11:41.960 There were people in the CBS chasing that. Even News 0:11:42.080 --> 0:11:44.839 was chasing them. Last fifty seventh was chasing them. We 0:11:44.920 --> 0:11:47.280 were in the office every day, and our office people 0:11:47.360 --> 0:11:50.240 are Bureau was working night and day to get that interview. 0:11:50.280 --> 0:11:52.440 So was every other journalist in the country. And there 0:11:52.480 --> 0:11:54.120 were a lot of big names there from all the 0:11:54.200 --> 0:11:57.080 other networks. Everybody and their mother was chasing that story, 0:11:57.360 --> 0:11:59.760 including the New York Times Washington Post. 0:12:00.840 --> 0:12:03.959 This brings us back to our favorite CBS News correspondent, 0:12:04.160 --> 0:12:07.200 Jane Wallace, who had been circling the story for years. 0:12:07.440 --> 0:12:11.199 I am in my office in New York City. I 0:12:11.360 --> 0:12:14.679 know exactly what this guy was doing there. I know 0:12:15.000 --> 0:12:18.160 that he's working for Ali North's network and that they're 0:12:18.200 --> 0:12:22.400 spook related. We're not sure exactly what level of the 0:12:22.480 --> 0:12:27.480 White House above Ali knows about this operation, but we 0:12:27.679 --> 0:12:30.120 know who Haus and Frus is the minute. They're pulling 0:12:30.160 --> 0:12:32.800 them around by the rope. I'm trying to get on 0:12:32.880 --> 0:12:36.199 a plane to Monogua. I'm trying to go through Miami 0:12:36.360 --> 0:12:40.480 to get to Nicaragua. CBS is not letting me fly. 0:12:41.240 --> 0:12:45.839 I owed them expense reports. Expense reports were the bane 0:12:45.960 --> 0:12:51.040 of everybody's existence, just hideously boring to do, down to 0:12:51.160 --> 0:12:55.120 the last centavo. They are not letting me put anything 0:12:55.640 --> 0:12:59.880 on my American Express card to get there. 0:13:00.520 --> 0:13:02.000 Hold on, let me, let me get this straight. 0:13:02.440 --> 0:13:05.080 The biggest story of the eighties is unfolding in front 0:13:05.120 --> 0:13:05.880 of your face, and I. 0:13:05.880 --> 0:13:08.400 Can't get on a plane because I can't buy the 0:13:08.520 --> 0:13:13.480 ticket yet. It was breath taking me, stupid. I'm sure 0:13:13.559 --> 0:13:16.079 I spoke to Manny. I'm sure as spoke to Leslie. 0:13:16.120 --> 0:13:18.160 We're all trying to get there as fast as we could. 0:13:18.200 --> 0:13:21.000 We knew exactly what the story was. I mean, you know, 0:13:21.160 --> 0:13:23.760 not the guy's details in his hometown, but we knew 0:13:23.760 --> 0:13:26.640 what he was doing there and why you fell out 0:13:26.679 --> 0:13:29.319 of that plane when he hit the ground. It was 0:13:29.840 --> 0:13:35.559 so frustrating. My eyes were bulging with a desire to 0:13:35.640 --> 0:13:39.440 get there and to get this story. We'd been waiting, 0:13:39.840 --> 0:13:42.079 we'd been taking all the Knox as if we had 0:13:42.240 --> 0:13:45.880 reported this all, because we'd reported it closer than anybody 0:13:45.920 --> 0:13:48.800 else had, at least as far as I know, And 0:13:48.960 --> 0:13:51.679 if somebody was further ahead on the story than us, 0:13:51.720 --> 0:13:53.680 I'd love to know about it now, because I would 0:13:53.720 --> 0:13:54.480 have missed it. 0:13:54.600 --> 0:13:54.760 Then. 0:13:55.440 --> 0:13:59.719 We wanted Hasenfuss, no question as CBS won't let me 0:13:59.760 --> 0:14:02.559 buy damn plane ticket, so I charged it on my 0:14:02.720 --> 0:14:06.679 own card and eventually head down there. I think someone 0:14:06.840 --> 0:14:09.640 was holding us up on permission to go too, and 0:14:09.840 --> 0:14:12.440 I just jumped it forget it. I don't remember where 0:14:12.520 --> 0:14:15.320 Manny was. I don't know if he was in country, 0:14:15.400 --> 0:14:18.240 out of country, the whole crew, Leslie, I'm not sure. 0:14:18.520 --> 0:14:22.200 We just all headed to go. We knew because the 0:14:22.320 --> 0:14:26.520 Intercontinental was sent a tiny town where everybody knew what 0:14:26.680 --> 0:14:30.040 everybody else was doing. We'd be noticed if I showed 0:14:30.120 --> 0:14:34.960 up again with Manny and Leslie and George Closa and Cookie, 0:14:35.560 --> 0:14:38.760 if the whole band gets back together, everybody's going to 0:14:38.920 --> 0:14:43.000 notice if we stayed there. We didn't have a solid 0:14:43.080 --> 0:14:45.920 book yet on Hausinfuest. We didn't have it nailed in 0:14:46.080 --> 0:14:48.880 terms of our access to him, but we decided to 0:14:48.920 --> 0:14:51.960 go to the Camino instead, so that we could at 0:14:52.080 --> 0:14:55.640 least stay low profile waiting to go interview this dude. 0:14:56.000 --> 0:14:59.320 So we get to Monagua, go to the Camino, and 0:15:00.200 --> 0:15:03.480 the next three days, I'm sitting by a pool, simmery, 0:15:04.320 --> 0:15:10.520 just simmery, waiting, waiting, waiting for a call. I'm just 0:15:11.120 --> 0:15:15.400 sitting there. Leslie is just sitting there. George and Manny 0:15:15.880 --> 0:15:19.600 are just sitting there waiting for the call to go 0:15:19.960 --> 0:15:23.680 interview Hausenfors. It was just stand by. 0:15:27.680 --> 0:15:31.320 So that Friday, I'm sitting in the CBS office in 0:15:31.440 --> 0:15:34.880 Miami and I get that called. So I get the 0:15:35.000 --> 0:15:39.000 bright idea. Wait, they're going to put this guy on trial. 0:15:39.120 --> 0:15:41.600 It's going to be a sham trial. He's going to 0:15:41.600 --> 0:15:44.440 be found guilty, you know, whether they're going to kill 0:15:44.520 --> 0:15:47.800 him or put him in prison. Was it yet quite 0:15:47.880 --> 0:15:51.280 clear to me what was going to happen. So I 0:15:51.400 --> 0:15:54.920 said to myself, let me call my friends at sixty minutes, 0:15:55.280 --> 0:15:59.440 and so I proceed to call Mike Wallace and Don Hewett. 0:15:59.640 --> 0:16:03.520 We were all friends and obviously colleagues. I had them 0:16:03.600 --> 0:16:07.240 on speakerphone and I said, Mike, Don, wouldn't it be 0:16:07.640 --> 0:16:12.560 great if we get this guy to confess on sixty 0:16:12.640 --> 0:16:16.480 minutes this Sunday coming and he confesses to the whole world. 0:16:17.200 --> 0:16:20.640 Wouldn't that be great? Mike dropped the phone. He couldn't 0:16:20.680 --> 0:16:23.560 believe it. You could hear Don Hewitt screaming. 0:16:23.200 --> 0:16:23.920 In the background. 0:16:24.520 --> 0:16:28.800 Fuck yeah, fuck yeah, get this story FORX Cookie, get 0:16:28.840 --> 0:16:32.560 that interview for us. And I said, okay, got off 0:16:32.600 --> 0:16:36.640 the phone with them. Called Ortega's right hand guy said 0:16:36.680 --> 0:16:38.760 to him, look, I know who you've got. 0:16:39.080 --> 0:16:41.040 I know what he means to you guys. 0:16:41.560 --> 0:16:44.520 I also figure you're gonna put him on trial. What 0:16:44.720 --> 0:16:48.840 if you let me and sixty minutes put him on 0:16:49.040 --> 0:16:52.400 the air this Sunday and have him confess to the 0:16:52.480 --> 0:16:55.560 whole world before you put on your trial. The guy 0:16:56.040 --> 0:17:00.400 loved the idea. He says, fuck yeah, we'll make that 0:17:00.640 --> 0:17:01.240 happen for you. 0:17:01.400 --> 0:17:01.760 Cookie. 0:17:02.360 --> 0:17:05.880 I said to Mike, we got it. We're in I said, 0:17:05.920 --> 0:17:08.640 but I'm in Miami right now. I'm not in Nicaragua. 0:17:08.920 --> 0:17:10.600 He says, I don't give a fuck. We'll pick you 0:17:10.720 --> 0:17:12.840 up in the jet. In fact, we'll pick you up 0:17:12.880 --> 0:17:17.000 tomorrow morning. We'll come in, we'll do the interview, we 0:17:17.160 --> 0:17:20.240 fly back out, edit it, put it on the air Sunday. 0:17:20.600 --> 0:17:20.840 Great. 0:17:21.680 --> 0:17:24.520 Cookie gets the biggest scoop of her career, but the 0:17:24.640 --> 0:17:29.760 story just gets crazier. We'll be right back, see you 0:17:29.880 --> 0:17:38.000 on the other side, Welcome back. Before we get to 0:17:38.080 --> 0:17:41.040 the fallout from the big sixty minutes interview, let's find 0:17:41.080 --> 0:17:44.320 out how Eugene Hasenfus ended up in the skies of Nicaragua. 0:17:45.400 --> 0:17:48.040 An ex marine, he started working for an outfit called 0:17:48.119 --> 0:17:51.359 Air America during the Vietnam War. It's best known for 0:17:51.480 --> 0:17:55.040 supplying and supporting covert and mostly illegal special ops in 0:17:55.119 --> 0:17:59.359 Southeast Asia during the Vietnam War, including drug smuggling and laos. 0:18:00.080 --> 0:18:02.240 They even made a movie about it, starring Mel Gibson 0:18:02.280 --> 0:18:05.000 and Robert Downey Junior Geane. 0:18:06.600 --> 0:18:07.639 We're not here right now? 0:18:10.720 --> 0:18:12.200 Yeah, I saw Nixon on TV. 0:18:12.520 --> 0:18:14.439 Yeah, so if we're not. 0:18:14.480 --> 0:18:19.840 Actually here, then of course this didn't happen as well. 0:18:19.920 --> 0:18:22.680 Maybe it didn't happen for you, and maybe it didn't happen. 0:18:22.520 --> 0:18:23.240 For Nixon, but. 0:18:24.760 --> 0:18:28.359 I think it happened for doug Are America also played 0:18:28.359 --> 0:18:31.080 a huge part in the evacuation of Saigon in nineteen 0:18:31.160 --> 0:18:34.560 seventy five. You've probably seen the footage of helicopters taking 0:18:34.600 --> 0:18:37.000 people off the rooftops as the Viet com closed in 0:18:37.119 --> 0:18:37.560 around them. 0:18:37.720 --> 0:18:41.000 On April twenty ninth and thirtieth, the United States evacuated 0:18:41.080 --> 0:18:43.840 all remaining Americans, as well as some one hundred and 0:18:43.920 --> 0:18:47.600 twenty thousand South Vietnamese. Two ships waiting off the ghosts 0:18:47.640 --> 0:18:51.800 of Vietnam. As the last American helicopter lifted off from 0:18:51.840 --> 0:18:55.399 the roof of the American Embassy, North Vietnamese tanks rolled 0:18:55.440 --> 0:18:58.560 through the city and onto the grounds of the Presidential Palace. 0:19:00.400 --> 0:19:02.600 There's a famous photo of that effort that, like the 0:19:02.680 --> 0:19:05.840 Hasenfus picture, became a symbol of the failure of another 0:19:06.000 --> 0:19:10.080 US intervention. Air America helicopters were among the last flights out. 0:19:10.920 --> 0:19:14.359 They have quite a history. Eugene Hasenfuss was proud of 0:19:14.400 --> 0:19:14.919 his service. 0:19:15.400 --> 0:19:17.720 I loved Air America, and I love for anything that 0:19:17.800 --> 0:19:19.560 our country will do and write. And whether it was 0:19:19.640 --> 0:19:22.760 CIA over there or whatever, this year was supposed to 0:19:22.840 --> 0:19:27.240 be another sequel of exactly what Air America was doing 0:19:27.720 --> 0:19:32.119 over in Southeast Asia, just be a different geographical location 0:19:32.280 --> 0:19:34.960 and a time sequence, but otherwise it'd be exactly the 0:19:35.040 --> 0:19:36.200 same working for the government. 0:19:37.160 --> 0:19:40.440 Back to our story. Last time we saw Jane Wallace, 0:19:41.000 --> 0:19:43.560 she was on pins and needles, waiting for a phone 0:19:43.600 --> 0:19:44.480 call that never came. 0:19:45.240 --> 0:19:48.280 I think three days in, three very long days in 0:19:48.840 --> 0:19:52.520 at the last minute, Manny and Georgia getting beep to go. 0:19:52.920 --> 0:19:55.200 What do you mean, Manny and Georgia getting beep to go? 0:19:56.000 --> 0:19:57.200 COOKI what's the deal? 0:19:57.600 --> 0:20:01.159 When sixty minutes calls you, it's like you're going to 0:20:01.200 --> 0:20:04.960 answer that call. The airport in Monagua was closed on 0:20:05.040 --> 0:20:07.440 the weekends, no flights in her out. So Manny and 0:20:07.520 --> 0:20:09.720 I were chilling. We're at the hotel. I think we 0:20:09.800 --> 0:20:11.879 were either by the pool or we were gonna go 0:20:11.960 --> 0:20:14.280 shopping and Messiah and they tell us say no, no, no, 0:20:14.400 --> 0:20:17.240 no no, they're opening the airport tomorrow. They're gonna be 0:20:17.359 --> 0:20:20.119 coming in and it's gonna be a Leer jet and 0:20:20.280 --> 0:20:23.960 cookies on it with Mike Wallace and Don Hewett and 0:20:24.119 --> 0:20:27.920 that they got the interview with Eugene Hoseefice and Manny 0:20:27.960 --> 0:20:30.080 and I weare Wow, what a coup. 0:20:30.920 --> 0:20:33.359 They didn't know we were in town. They were just 0:20:33.440 --> 0:20:36.879 beeping any available crew to go interview hosstive for us, 0:20:37.160 --> 0:20:41.040 and we got stumped. We got stumped. Mike Wallace came 0:20:41.080 --> 0:20:44.800 to town with his crew, took my crew and my 0:20:45.160 --> 0:20:48.560 interviewee That's how I felt. But they were two days 0:20:48.640 --> 0:20:51.200 later than us. They didn't even know what they were after. 0:20:51.840 --> 0:20:54.840 The reason we didn't get that story was because Cookie 0:20:55.000 --> 0:20:57.960 wasn't in Monogola. She knew what we were working on. 0:20:58.400 --> 0:21:03.200 We already knew they were running guns at the least, 0:21:03.920 --> 0:21:08.040 and it already had powder residue of cocaine around the 0:21:08.280 --> 0:21:12.520 edges of that story of running guns. We'd already preased 0:21:12.560 --> 0:21:15.600 it up to auber North. We knew what was going 0:21:15.680 --> 0:21:18.879 on there. I mean, the only thing we didn't have 0:21:19.720 --> 0:21:21.959 was a picture of a guy being let around by 0:21:22.000 --> 0:21:23.920 a rope in the jungle. It turned out to be 0:21:23.960 --> 0:21:26.520 a redhead from Wisconsin. We were onto them. 0:21:27.920 --> 0:21:32.040 Mike and Don fly into Miami's picked me up the 0:21:32.119 --> 0:21:36.359 next morning the lear Jet and we're flying back to 0:21:36.520 --> 0:21:40.239 Managua to do this great interview. But remember I had 0:21:40.280 --> 0:21:44.280 been on vacation. Chino, who's by then my ex husband, 0:21:44.760 --> 0:21:47.720 was there. I knew I needed some party favors to 0:21:47.840 --> 0:21:50.760 take back with me. Chico was on vacation with me, 0:21:50.880 --> 0:21:53.119 so I knew I was leaving him in Miami, and 0:21:53.280 --> 0:21:55.399 so I said to Chino, you need to bring me 0:21:55.480 --> 0:21:59.080 some supplies because I'm leaving tomorrow morning with sixty minutes, 0:21:59.280 --> 0:22:03.480 and he brought me a nice hefty supply of party material. 0:22:03.920 --> 0:22:06.120 We're talking cocaine, obviously. 0:22:06.280 --> 0:22:09.320 So imset lear jet Land. 0:22:09.880 --> 0:22:13.520 We get on fly to Monagua, and of course we're 0:22:13.560 --> 0:22:17.280 not going through customs because it's cookie and it's sixty minutes. 0:22:17.480 --> 0:22:21.199 Nothing's gonna be checked. I'm cool, nobody's gonna check anything. 0:22:21.400 --> 0:22:24.480 Low and the whole sixty minute flies in cookies coming 0:22:24.520 --> 0:22:26.640 down the steps. So the lear Jet, she says, guys, 0:22:26.960 --> 0:22:28.960 we're going right to the jail. We're gonna do this 0:22:29.200 --> 0:22:32.719 right now. Okay, the Guatemalins crew is gonna come with us. 0:22:32.760 --> 0:22:34.680 They'll be the second camera. But you guys got the 0:22:34.800 --> 0:22:36.920 ball on this. So Manny and I were like, okay, great, 0:22:37.000 --> 0:22:39.080 let's go, and she says, but first we got to 0:22:39.119 --> 0:22:42.520 stop and we gotta make peace with the local CBS guys. 0:22:42.880 --> 0:22:45.399 So we went to a restaurant. We sat down and 0:22:45.520 --> 0:22:48.760 we're eating and Don Hewitt and Mike Wallace are having 0:22:48.960 --> 0:22:52.720 lunch with our producer and our reporter people in charge 0:22:52.760 --> 0:22:55.680 of Central America for CBS for the evening years. 0:22:56.000 --> 0:22:59.840 That would be CBS News correspondent Michael O'Connor and producer 0:23:00.080 --> 0:23:03.119 on siselof who you've met several times in this series. 0:23:03.560 --> 0:23:07.399 They were not happy that sixty minutes was just flying in. 0:23:07.880 --> 0:23:11.200 And the term we use in the business is bigfooting. 0:23:11.680 --> 0:23:15.119 Mike Wallace is about as big a foot as there is. 0:23:15.359 --> 0:23:17.800 There might not be any bigger. They come in and 0:23:17.920 --> 0:23:21.040 they take the story from me and they make it theirs. 0:23:21.400 --> 0:23:24.560 So they were complaining to Mike and Don about, Hey, 0:23:24.680 --> 0:23:26.879 you know, it's not fair that we've been humping on 0:23:27.040 --> 0:23:28.800 the story and then you guys come in here at 0:23:28.800 --> 0:23:32.080 the last second and just get the interview. They were resentful. 0:23:32.359 --> 0:23:34.800 Boza told me that Michael Connell was leading the charge 0:23:35.480 --> 0:23:38.320 and he respected him for it, but standing up against 0:23:38.359 --> 0:23:40.359 big foot was probably not a good idea. 0:23:40.800 --> 0:23:44.040 Mike and Don they didn't like that. They didn't like 0:23:44.119 --> 0:23:47.200 hearing that. And I remember that they said, you could 0:23:47.200 --> 0:23:50.000 have come with us today and gotten one question. We 0:23:50.040 --> 0:23:52.480 would have asked one question and you could have used 0:23:52.520 --> 0:23:56.000 that one question for Tonight's evening used broadcast. But since 0:23:56.080 --> 0:23:59.280 you got an attitude you're not coming. You can come, 0:23:59.400 --> 0:24:02.160 They told the you can come and you can take notes, 0:24:02.520 --> 0:24:05.520 but that's it. I was like, Wow, this is like 0:24:06.000 --> 0:24:08.720 the big leagues. This is stuff that usually you know, 0:24:08.880 --> 0:24:11.480 get the witness. And then we went to the jail. 0:24:12.800 --> 0:24:14.520 I was furious. 0:24:15.280 --> 0:24:17.320 They were just trying to move our pieces off the 0:24:17.359 --> 0:24:20.520 board and take what we had. They were way behind us. 0:24:20.960 --> 0:24:24.359 I'd gotten all kinds of heat for why are you 0:24:24.480 --> 0:24:27.040 putting this garbage on the air? You know it's not true, 0:24:27.520 --> 0:24:31.800 And I'd gotten that inside from the head of CBS News, 0:24:32.040 --> 0:24:34.600 like you know, what is this hot air? Are you 0:24:34.920 --> 0:24:38.960 kidding me? So then the proof is in this redheaded guy, 0:24:39.640 --> 0:24:41.920 and the proof goes to someone who didn't even have 0:24:42.119 --> 0:24:46.480 the story. Oh god, Mike Wallace was a nasty man 0:24:46.960 --> 0:24:50.960 and a very sexist guy, a horribly sexist guy. It 0:24:51.160 --> 0:24:53.919 wasn't just that he beat you on your own story, 0:24:54.480 --> 0:24:57.440 it was that he didn't take you belonged there in 0:24:57.520 --> 0:24:58.280 the first place. 0:24:59.520 --> 0:25:03.280 Every journalists that had been in Monagua based in Managua, 0:25:03.640 --> 0:25:07.040 flown into Monogua for the story. They're all outside at 0:25:07.080 --> 0:25:09.879 the bottom of the stairs in the street, and of 0:25:10.000 --> 0:25:15.159 course everyone wants hasidfoos and nobody's getting hasid foods except yours, truly, 0:25:15.600 --> 0:25:17.800 And when we get there, you know, it's like all 0:25:17.880 --> 0:25:20.639 the journalists had to part like the Red Sea to 0:25:20.760 --> 0:25:21.400 let us through. 0:25:21.800 --> 0:25:23.200 And I remember there was one. 0:25:23.240 --> 0:25:27.880 Journalist from ABC who kind of whispered to me and said, well, 0:25:27.960 --> 0:25:30.640 we know how you got this story. I whispered back 0:25:30.680 --> 0:25:33.040 to him, Well, in l Salvador, we know how you 0:25:33.160 --> 0:25:34.040 get your stories. 0:25:34.960 --> 0:25:37.760 That ABC News correspondent was Peter Collins, one of the 0:25:37.840 --> 0:25:40.720 biggest stars of that network. As far as what Cookie 0:25:40.800 --> 0:25:43.240 is referring to, I'll just leave that there. 0:25:43.760 --> 0:25:47.720 Super competitive. Everyone wanted that story. That's a career story. 0:25:47.960 --> 0:25:49.919 That's one that makes your career. You know, you get 0:25:49.960 --> 0:25:52.320 the exclusive on that one, and your life is going 0:25:52.400 --> 0:25:55.080 to change. Yeah, there's a lot of jealousy involved, Dad, 0:25:55.200 --> 0:25:57.600 and you had a lot of veteran reporters there, the 0:25:57.800 --> 0:26:00.840 La Times, the AP you know upm all right, Cookie 0:26:00.880 --> 0:26:03.680 out scooped them all. That hurts, you know, especially when 0:26:03.720 --> 0:26:06.120 your boss in New York is calling and going, hey, 0:26:06.200 --> 0:26:08.040 what happened? You know, why didn't you get it? 0:26:09.200 --> 0:26:13.080 We go upstairs, there's State security all over, there's the 0:26:13.440 --> 0:26:17.119 head of State Security there. So while they're all setting 0:26:17.240 --> 0:26:20.040 up for the interview, I of course asked the head 0:26:20.119 --> 0:26:23.280 of State security, where's your bathroom? Because you know what, 0:26:23.359 --> 0:26:25.480 I'm getting ready to go do. So I go to 0:26:25.560 --> 0:26:28.720 the bathroom and I swear to this day I say 0:26:28.800 --> 0:26:31.800 that was the best lines of coke that I ever did, 0:26:32.040 --> 0:26:35.400 because I'm being escorted by the head of State security 0:26:35.520 --> 0:26:37.760 to the bathroom in State security. 0:26:37.960 --> 0:26:40.200 It was just surreal. 0:26:40.280 --> 0:26:44.520 The Sandinistas are always uncomfortable when it comes to journalists, 0:26:44.840 --> 0:26:49.280 especially American journalists, especially American TV cameras, and when you 0:26:49.480 --> 0:26:53.040 have a star like Mike Wallace there, the detention level 0:26:53.200 --> 0:26:55.960 just goes through the roof. So everything is being done 0:26:56.119 --> 0:27:00.200 very methodically. They're searching, they're questioning, they're talking about where 0:27:00.320 --> 0:27:02.960 is the most secure place to do this? So we 0:27:03.119 --> 0:27:06.040 finally hammer out everything. Cookie was a big part of that. 0:27:06.320 --> 0:27:09.920 Cookie was handling most of the negotiations, interpreting, and we 0:27:10.040 --> 0:27:12.639 find the spot, we put all the lights up. It 0:27:12.720 --> 0:27:14.640 took us half an hour to get it all ready. 0:27:14.720 --> 0:27:18.200 Two crews, two cameras, one camera on Geen No one camera. 0:27:18.040 --> 0:27:23.480 On Mike Pozardfus is still just panicked because now he 0:27:23.640 --> 0:27:26.040 thinks that after he does this interview, he's going to 0:27:26.080 --> 0:27:28.800 be shot. First he looks over at me and I'm 0:27:28.800 --> 0:27:32.560 wearing two different color rebox tennis shoes. I'm wearing two 0:27:32.640 --> 0:27:36.520 different color socks. I'm wearing two different earrings in each 0:27:36.880 --> 0:27:39.840 ear and he kind of looks over at me in 0:27:39.960 --> 0:27:44.040 the nervous humor says to me, Wow, I've never seen 0:27:44.119 --> 0:27:48.240 anybody dressed like that, and we kind of laughed. His 0:27:48.560 --> 0:27:51.880 was a nervous laugh. I leaned over and I whispered 0:27:51.960 --> 0:27:54.040 to him. I said, you're not going to be killed 0:27:54.240 --> 0:27:55.240 after this interview. 0:27:55.560 --> 0:27:57.480 Did you feel like the interview itself was going to 0:27:57.520 --> 0:27:59.200 be sort of a layer of protection for him? 0:28:00.160 --> 0:28:01.440 No, not at all. 0:28:02.040 --> 0:28:06.040 That interview was going to be him admitting to all 0:28:06.480 --> 0:28:10.520 his quote unquote sins, which is what the Sandinistas we're 0:28:10.520 --> 0:28:13.440 going to put him on trial for. So no, he 0:28:13.640 --> 0:28:16.920 was convinced he would be shot after our interview because 0:28:16.960 --> 0:28:20.960 he would be admitting to everything that the Sandinistas wanted 0:28:21.080 --> 0:28:21.720 him to admit. 0:28:22.080 --> 0:28:23.720 So why would he admit to it? 0:28:24.000 --> 0:28:28.359 Because he's around Americans, he's with sixty minutes. I'm convincing 0:28:28.520 --> 0:28:31.440 him that everything's going to be okay. If and when 0:28:31.520 --> 0:28:35.040 you do this interview, it could be some protection because 0:28:35.119 --> 0:28:39.080 now the world will know that you exist. So I 0:28:39.240 --> 0:28:41.960 think I sort of allayed his fears, got him a 0:28:42.000 --> 0:28:43.360 little comfortable. 0:28:44.760 --> 0:28:48.360 Door opens. Then comes hasin first and shackled. They walk 0:28:48.400 --> 0:28:50.960 him around to the front of the chair. As soon 0:28:51.040 --> 0:28:54.280 as hozin First's but hits the chair, the lights go 0:28:54.360 --> 0:28:57.080 out right out. Que I mean, it couldn't have happened 0:28:57.280 --> 0:28:58.640 in a more timely fashion. 0:28:59.080 --> 0:29:04.520 All hell broken and then precedes what we call Murphy's law. 0:29:05.000 --> 0:29:09.040 Everything that could go wrong starts to go wrong. The 0:29:09.160 --> 0:29:12.600 electricity goes out. Remember we're in a third world country. 0:29:12.960 --> 0:29:15.600 One of the camera crews, one of their pieces of 0:29:15.680 --> 0:29:20.000 equipment goes out, and just slowly everything is going wrong. 0:29:20.480 --> 0:29:23.240 It's dark, you can see a little bit, but immediately 0:29:23.400 --> 0:29:26.720 the Sandinistas are on full alert. They grab hazard for us. 0:29:26.760 --> 0:29:28.960 They got their guns up. I think that they actually 0:29:29.040 --> 0:29:31.360 thought that there was a rescue attempt going to happen, 0:29:31.760 --> 0:29:34.080 like Chuck Norris was out there with the Delta Force 0:29:34.120 --> 0:29:36.560 and they were gonna come in and snatch them. So 0:29:36.760 --> 0:29:38.720 they're moving a mile a minute, and in the meantime, 0:29:38.960 --> 0:29:41.320 Hewitt is standing up and he's saying. 0:29:41.440 --> 0:29:43.840 Everybody's stay put, stay hut, stay hut. 0:29:43.880 --> 0:29:44.480 Nobody moved. 0:29:45.000 --> 0:29:49.160 Wallace is yelling, let's move everything outside, dice everything, let's 0:29:49.280 --> 0:29:51.440 just grab it. We'll do it outside. We don't need lights, 0:29:51.480 --> 0:29:55.840 let's just go. So we're all there like frozen. Manny 0:29:55.840 --> 0:29:57.880 and I are looking at each other like, who do 0:29:58.000 --> 0:30:00.520 we listen to? Do we listen to you with the 0:30:00.600 --> 0:30:03.400 creator of sixty minutes? Or do we listen to Mike Wallace? 0:30:03.600 --> 0:30:06.160 It's a death sentence. Wherever you listen to the other, 0:30:06.240 --> 0:30:09.840 one's gonna get pissed off. So we're frozen and we're 0:30:09.920 --> 0:30:11.600 trying to see what's gonna be next. 0:30:11.760 --> 0:30:14.920 And somebody I don't remember if it was Cookie or 0:30:14.960 --> 0:30:17.600 it could have been Manny, that said, let's just do 0:30:17.760 --> 0:30:21.200 it outside. And we went outside and we set it up, 0:30:21.280 --> 0:30:23.880 and the Sandinistas were cool about the whole thing. They 0:30:24.000 --> 0:30:26.360 held on for him until we were ready. Literally we 0:30:26.480 --> 0:30:29.320 set up in seven minutes, like bam, bam, bam, bam bam. 0:30:29.560 --> 0:30:31.800 Put the chair on the ground, they brought him, They 0:30:31.880 --> 0:30:34.280 sat him, and Don Yue It stepped in between both 0:30:34.320 --> 0:30:36.520 cameras like he used to do in the good old 0:30:36.600 --> 0:30:38.760 days of film. He looked and he said, okay, guys, 0:30:38.800 --> 0:30:41.680 we're gonna roll. Here's the slate and he slapped his hands. 0:30:43.160 --> 0:30:46.200 But it's starting to get late in the afternoon. We're 0:30:46.200 --> 0:30:49.600 going to lose the natural light. We're under a time constraight, 0:30:49.800 --> 0:30:53.680 we need to get this interview done. So the interview proceeds. 0:30:54.360 --> 0:30:58.200 Poor guy is admitting to everything. He's admitting that he 0:30:58.280 --> 0:31:02.520 worked for the CIA. You know, he's former military or 0:31:02.600 --> 0:31:06.720 still military. He's a kicker. It wasn't his first mission. 0:31:06.880 --> 0:31:10.720 He'd been doing that throughout the Sandinista conflict. It's not 0:31:10.880 --> 0:31:13.520 that this guy really knew any kind of you know, 0:31:13.760 --> 0:31:17.560 secret information or top secret things, but he knew enough 0:31:18.040 --> 0:31:21.400 to admit that he was guilty of what he had done. 0:31:22.000 --> 0:31:25.240 And we finished up the interview. It was great. He 0:31:25.400 --> 0:31:27.160 confessed to everything here. 0:31:27.360 --> 0:31:29.880 We know he's going to confess to the US audience 0:31:30.320 --> 0:31:33.880 on sixty minutes. And then as we're wrapping up, Don 0:31:34.000 --> 0:31:37.560 Hewitt looks at me and says, can we get anybody else, 0:31:37.840 --> 0:31:41.800 you know in the government to add to this peace? 0:31:42.120 --> 0:31:44.280 And I said, well, would you like to talk to 0:31:44.360 --> 0:31:47.560 the president? He says, you mean Ortega? I said sure, 0:31:47.560 --> 0:31:50.640 He says, can you get him? So I called my 0:31:50.760 --> 0:31:54.640 guy in you know, Ortega's inner circle, and I said 0:31:54.720 --> 0:31:57.960 to him, look, we've just wrapped up this hazardfous interview 0:31:58.240 --> 0:32:01.840 went well, he confessed to everything. You guys are gonna 0:32:01.960 --> 0:32:04.840 like what he said, can we possibly get the president 0:32:05.120 --> 0:32:08.400 to be in this piece and weigh in on what 0:32:08.720 --> 0:32:12.360 we've accomplished here. He said, you got it. I turned 0:32:12.400 --> 0:32:15.640 to Dunn and said we got it. He says, fuck yeah. 0:32:16.120 --> 0:32:18.840 So we all packed up. We went to where the 0:32:18.920 --> 0:32:23.040 president was going to meet us, and we're setting up. Mike, Wallace, 0:32:23.240 --> 0:32:29.680 Don myself, everybody's there. The interview begins and some lull. 0:32:30.200 --> 0:32:33.400 I leaned over to Mike and I said, Mike, ask 0:32:33.840 --> 0:32:37.640 the President if it's possible that Hazifus could be home 0:32:37.720 --> 0:32:41.160 for Christmas, because of course they had been asking ortego, 0:32:41.200 --> 0:32:41.840 you're going to put this. 0:32:41.920 --> 0:32:42.680 Guy on trial. 0:32:42.800 --> 0:32:45.760 He said, yes, obviously he's going to be found guilty 0:32:46.120 --> 0:32:48.200 or take us says, well, we don't know that. We're 0:32:48.280 --> 0:32:51.840 gonna let justice take its course. Of course, he already 0:32:51.920 --> 0:32:54.360 knew that Hazifusa had confessed to us. 0:32:55.120 --> 0:32:57.280 Mike's like, no, I'm not going to ask him that. 0:32:57.400 --> 0:32:59.320 I said, Mike, ask him if he's going to be. 0:32:59.360 --> 0:33:03.400 Home for christ and Don Hewitt overheard that and he 0:33:03.840 --> 0:33:08.520 liked that, and he says, Mike asked the question semi begrudgingly. 0:33:08.720 --> 0:33:13.000 Mike says to the President, mister President is it possible 0:33:13.400 --> 0:33:17.200 after the trial that this guy, obviously he could be 0:33:17.280 --> 0:33:18.920 thrown in prison, he could be shot. 0:33:19.280 --> 0:33:21.880 Is it possible that he could be home for Christmas? 0:33:22.200 --> 0:33:26.880 And Ortega smiles and he says, anything is possible, mister Wallace. 0:33:27.320 --> 0:33:28.280 We knew we had it. 0:33:28.800 --> 0:33:31.800 We knew this guy was going to be home for Christmas, 0:33:32.160 --> 0:33:33.920 but that was still a few months away. 0:33:34.400 --> 0:33:36.760 We got the story on both sides. 0:33:37.240 --> 0:33:40.640 It was perfect, and of course we're getting ready to 0:33:40.760 --> 0:33:44.200 fly out back to New York to edit the piece, and. 0:33:44.240 --> 0:33:47.000 It aired the next day on sixty minutes on Sunday, 0:33:47.160 --> 0:33:50.280 and it was earth shattering. It was a tremendous crew 0:33:50.360 --> 0:33:56.239 for CBS who came maneuver the government to accommodate us 0:33:56.480 --> 0:33:59.560 in this fashion, not only accommodate us with the interview, 0:34:00.000 --> 0:34:04.200 which was brilliant. For shoot inside a secure facility in 0:34:04.280 --> 0:34:07.840 a carnalist country where there's other prisoners is unheard of. 0:34:08.400 --> 0:34:12.320 This all happened because, of course it's sixty minutes, but 0:34:12.480 --> 0:34:17.759 it's the diplomacy and the tactfulness of Cookiehood that was 0:34:17.840 --> 0:34:21.720 able to make it all happen. Without her, that interview 0:34:21.760 --> 0:34:23.920 would have never happened, not in a million years. 0:34:25.640 --> 0:34:28.760 You think that's where this story ends. Not a chance. 0:34:29.360 --> 0:34:33.680 Cookie's just getting started. Pasen Fus was the smoking gun, 0:34:34.440 --> 0:34:37.480 but she's about to find the missing link, the money. 0:34:38.600 --> 0:34:48.839 We'll be right back, Welcome back. Cookie should have been 0:34:48.880 --> 0:34:51.560 heading back to Miami to finish your vacation with Chiico. 0:34:52.040 --> 0:34:53.799 But she wasn't done, not by a long shot. 0:34:54.440 --> 0:34:54.640 Oh. 0:34:55.000 --> 0:34:59.279 A stipulation that the Sandinista government made. They wanted a 0:34:59.440 --> 0:35:02.960 copy of our interview because they wanted to air it. 0:35:03.280 --> 0:35:07.080 Our stipulation was that it air after the sixty minutes 0:35:07.160 --> 0:35:09.719 broadcast aired. So I was going to be the one 0:35:10.080 --> 0:35:13.359 carrying back the copy. But of course I'm not going 0:35:13.400 --> 0:35:15.720 to fly back to Monagua and the lear jet because 0:35:15.800 --> 0:35:17.600 the big boys were already back home. 0:35:17.880 --> 0:35:20.080 So I was going to fly commercial. I get on 0:35:20.239 --> 0:35:21.560 the flight and there's a. 0:35:22.080 --> 0:35:25.080 Ton of journalists on the flight that were flying in 0:35:25.440 --> 0:35:26.520 for this big story. 0:35:26.800 --> 0:35:29.759 Because Miami is the direct connection too there you have 0:35:29.840 --> 0:35:31.040 to go to Miami to get there. 0:35:31.040 --> 0:35:33.960 Almost right, I flew back from New York to Miami 0:35:34.000 --> 0:35:36.480 and then Miami. I'm going to fly to Nicaragua and 0:35:36.600 --> 0:35:39.880 I get winn because I have family connections with the 0:35:40.000 --> 0:35:44.880 airline Tacka Airlines, and I get winned that Hazidfuss's wife, 0:35:45.040 --> 0:35:48.320 Sally is on the flight, but she didn't want to 0:35:48.360 --> 0:35:51.600 be harassed, so she's in the cockpit with the pilots. 0:35:52.080 --> 0:35:55.040 So not only myself gets wind of it, all the 0:35:55.160 --> 0:35:56.400 other journalists get. 0:35:56.320 --> 0:35:56.840 Wind of it. 0:35:57.200 --> 0:35:58.400 Everybody's talking about it. 0:35:58.640 --> 0:36:01.440 Everybody's talking about it. But since I have the family 0:36:01.520 --> 0:36:05.239 connection with the airline, I go up to the front to. 0:36:05.640 --> 0:36:08.839 At that time, we're called stewardesses, and I go up 0:36:08.880 --> 0:36:12.239 to one that I actually knew in person because of 0:36:12.320 --> 0:36:15.720 all my year's fly tackle, because of our family connection, 0:36:16.200 --> 0:36:20.000 And I said to her, I know that there's someone 0:36:20.080 --> 0:36:22.719 in the cockpit, and I know you can't say it 0:36:23.080 --> 0:36:26.040 or agree with me that there is, but is it 0:36:26.200 --> 0:36:28.440 possible for you to give a note to the person 0:36:28.520 --> 0:36:31.399 that's not in the cockpit? And she says, Cookie, I'll 0:36:31.440 --> 0:36:34.480 do it because it's you. I said the note to Sally, 0:36:35.000 --> 0:36:38.640 saying my name is Cookie. I'm with CBS, I was 0:36:38.719 --> 0:36:42.440 with Eugene yesterday, your husband, can I speak to you 0:36:42.600 --> 0:36:43.320 in the cockpit? 0:36:43.719 --> 0:36:46.239 Flight attended takes it up. I don't know what's going 0:36:46.320 --> 0:36:47.520 to happen. Next thing. 0:36:47.600 --> 0:36:51.239 I know she's coming back looking for me, saying come on, 0:36:51.520 --> 0:36:53.839 you're going to the cockpit. And you could just see 0:36:53.880 --> 0:36:56.640 the journalists in the flight. They're all, oh, you know, 0:36:56.800 --> 0:37:00.480 everybody's revolting. Why does she get to go up? 0:37:00.640 --> 0:37:01.920 Whatever? I don't care. 0:37:02.800 --> 0:37:05.520 So I'm in the cockpit with Sally and I said, Sally, 0:37:05.600 --> 0:37:09.600 I was with Eugene yesterday. We did a segment for 0:37:10.200 --> 0:37:13.879 sixty minutes. He did a great interview. I just want 0:37:13.960 --> 0:37:16.879 to tell you he's okay. And she says to me, well, 0:37:16.920 --> 0:37:17.400 how do I. 0:37:17.640 --> 0:37:21.080 Know that you were with Eugene? I said, well, he 0:37:21.200 --> 0:37:22.280 said something funny. 0:37:22.600 --> 0:37:25.280 I was wearing two different color Tendi shoes, two different 0:37:25.360 --> 0:37:28.239 color pair of socks, two different types of earrings. 0:37:27.960 --> 0:37:30.880 In each ear and he looked over at me and 0:37:31.000 --> 0:37:31.520 he made. 0:37:31.360 --> 0:37:35.040 A comment, a funny comment, saying I've never seen anybody 0:37:35.160 --> 0:37:38.759 dressed like that before. And for some reason, that let 0:37:38.840 --> 0:37:41.840 her know, and she believed that I had been with Eugene, 0:37:42.239 --> 0:37:43.440 and so she was at that. 0:37:43.640 --> 0:37:46.280 Point, Oh, please tell me. Is he okay? 0:37:46.400 --> 0:37:49.240 I said, he's okay, And I want to tell you something. 0:37:49.680 --> 0:37:52.279 I tried to comfort him, and I'm going to tell 0:37:52.320 --> 0:37:53.040 you the same thing. 0:37:53.080 --> 0:37:55.760 I told him. He's going to be put on trial. 0:37:56.120 --> 0:37:58.719 He's going to be found guilty, but he will not 0:37:59.000 --> 0:38:01.160 go to prison, and he will not be shot. 0:38:01.440 --> 0:38:04.359 He will be going home with you. I don't know when. 0:38:04.800 --> 0:38:07.919 I said, maybe Christmas, but he will be going home 0:38:08.000 --> 0:38:08.200 with you. 0:38:08.520 --> 0:38:11.879 And she just grabbed my hand and in tears said, oh, 0:38:11.960 --> 0:38:14.680 I'm so grateful, you know, I'm so grateful that you 0:38:14.760 --> 0:38:17.320 were able to see him and give him some hope. 0:38:17.719 --> 0:38:20.799 And I said, well, we have a caveat here. I'm 0:38:20.840 --> 0:38:23.320 going to ask you for one favor. I am not 0:38:23.480 --> 0:38:25.960 going to follow you around for how many months you're 0:38:26.040 --> 0:38:29.840 in Monagua. I am not going to bother you and call. 0:38:29.719 --> 0:38:30.680 You for interviews. 0:38:31.120 --> 0:38:34.120 You won't even see me except in the background. But 0:38:34.280 --> 0:38:37.719 the day your husband gets released, I'm going to call 0:38:37.840 --> 0:38:41.399 you and you're going to be mine that day. You're 0:38:41.480 --> 0:38:43.719 not going to give anyone else to tom of day. 0:38:43.800 --> 0:38:46.200 You're not going to give any interviews, You're not going 0:38:46.280 --> 0:38:49.920 to give any soundbites to anybody. You're going to be 0:38:50.040 --> 0:38:53.480 with me, She says, cookie, anything, anything. 0:38:55.040 --> 0:38:58.839 Meanwhile, the sixty minutes Hazen food story runs that Sunday night. 0:38:59.480 --> 0:39:02.600 The New York j Times wrote this about the historic interview. 0:39:02.760 --> 0:39:06.640 Eugene Hasenfus, The American survivor from the aircraft that was 0:39:06.680 --> 0:39:10.640 shot down over Nicaragua on October fifth, said yesterday that 0:39:10.760 --> 0:39:13.279 he believed Vice President Bush was well aware of the 0:39:13.320 --> 0:39:17.360 private operation to resupply the Nicaraguan rebels. In the interview 0:39:17.400 --> 0:39:20.800 with Mike Wallace on the CBS news program Sixty Minutes, 0:39:21.160 --> 0:39:24.320 Hassenphus said he was told the resupply effort for the rebels, 0:39:24.760 --> 0:39:28.879 or contrast, was similar to CIA sponsored operations in which 0:39:28.920 --> 0:39:32.200 he took part in Southeast Asia. He estimated that about 0:39:32.239 --> 0:39:35.600 fourteen Americans operating out of El Salvador were engaged in 0:39:35.640 --> 0:39:39.000 the underground effort to resupply the contries with arms and ammunition. 0:39:39.400 --> 0:39:43.239 Hassenfas said twenty four to twenty six company people, a 0:39:43.400 --> 0:39:46.600 term commonly used in connection with the CIA, were involved. 0:39:47.080 --> 0:39:50.960 Hassenfas said he believes the Reagan administration quote is backing 0:39:51.080 --> 0:39:56.200 this resupply operation one hundred percent. Asked by Wallace if 0:39:56.200 --> 0:40:01.719 he had felt that you were working for the US government, applied, yes, sir. 0:40:03.200 --> 0:40:05.920 You think this story is crazy, wait till you hear this. 0:40:07.360 --> 0:40:09.560 So you got access to what was found in the. 0:40:09.560 --> 0:40:12.560 Wreckage, right, I was thinking I was going to get 0:40:12.640 --> 0:40:14.400 first access. I didn't know. 0:40:14.520 --> 0:40:19.239 I got only access every piece of evidence that was 0:40:19.400 --> 0:40:24.400 found in the wreckage was logged in by number, by picture, 0:40:25.000 --> 0:40:31.000 and an explanation of what each item was. So I asked, 0:40:31.320 --> 0:40:34.200 can I, you know, get a look at all this stuff? 0:40:34.719 --> 0:40:37.320 And I'm told Jess, you can, but you'll be the 0:40:37.440 --> 0:40:41.120 only one, and we don't want you sharing the information 0:40:41.360 --> 0:40:45.560 with other journalists or anybody for that matter. We don't 0:40:45.600 --> 0:40:49.000 really want anybody to know we're giving you access to 0:40:49.160 --> 0:40:51.400 all this high level secret stuff. 0:40:52.200 --> 0:40:53.239 So I spent the. 0:40:53.360 --> 0:40:58.360 Whole day going through you know, little things, big things, minutia. 0:40:58.960 --> 0:40:59.960 What kind of stuff was. 0:41:00.719 --> 0:41:03.120 Well, some of it it said that it was from 0:41:03.160 --> 0:41:06.680 the pilot, some of it was from the second victim 0:41:06.960 --> 0:41:10.520 of the crash, and some of it was Hasenfusa stuff. 0:41:10.640 --> 0:41:13.920 I think like they had his parachute and maybe some 0:41:14.080 --> 0:41:16.880 of the things that he was kicking out and hadn't 0:41:16.960 --> 0:41:22.319 yet completed. Apparently the pilot had a briefcase with him, 0:41:22.600 --> 0:41:24.000 you know, he didn't think he was going to get 0:41:24.040 --> 0:41:27.239 shot down and killed. And in this briefcase is just 0:41:27.560 --> 0:41:33.480 a slew of paperwork and business cards and just a 0:41:33.600 --> 0:41:36.840 ton of stuff that who knows what it was. So 0:41:37.000 --> 0:41:40.560 I come across this business card, and this business card 0:41:40.600 --> 0:41:43.880 on the front was from a Swiss bank. The business 0:41:43.960 --> 0:41:49.040 card belonged to the vice president of this Swiss bank, 0:41:49.360 --> 0:41:51.280 and of course it had his phone number. 0:41:51.520 --> 0:41:52.040 What bank? 0:41:52.480 --> 0:41:55.040 And on the back of the card was a slew 0:41:55.120 --> 0:41:59.239 of numbers and the Sandinistas had logged this in as 0:41:59.320 --> 0:42:01.840 a business card, and that on the back was. 0:42:01.840 --> 0:42:02.600 A phone number. 0:42:03.200 --> 0:42:05.960 I knew that was not a phone number. It was 0:42:06.160 --> 0:42:10.959 too damn long of a sequence of numbers. I said 0:42:10.960 --> 0:42:14.440 to myself, what if this is a Swiss bank account? 0:42:14.920 --> 0:42:17.880 But would this pilot have been stupid enough to be 0:42:18.360 --> 0:42:22.080 carrying that information? Because I think he was in charge 0:42:22.120 --> 0:42:24.920 of the Swiss bank account he had access to it. 0:42:25.239 --> 0:42:27.360 I actually took the card with me. 0:42:27.760 --> 0:42:29.880 I wasn't supposed to, but I took the card with 0:42:30.120 --> 0:42:33.440 me and went back to the office called Switzerland and 0:42:33.600 --> 0:42:36.279 asked to speak to the vice president of this bank. 0:42:36.480 --> 0:42:40.000 I identified myself, I said, in one of your cards 0:42:40.280 --> 0:42:44.440 was found in the wreckage in Nicaragua by I assume 0:42:44.960 --> 0:42:48.200 one of the people that could access an account. I said, 0:42:48.360 --> 0:42:50.960 I know you can't tell me if somebody has an 0:42:50.960 --> 0:42:53.320 account in your bank. I know you can't tell me 0:42:53.480 --> 0:42:57.759 anything about anything, but would it be okay if I 0:42:57.960 --> 0:43:01.640 read you a sequence of numbers and all I want 0:43:01.680 --> 0:43:04.279 you to say is yes or no? Could this be 0:43:04.880 --> 0:43:08.600 a Swiss bank account? And I read the sequence of numbers, 0:43:09.080 --> 0:43:12.880 he said yes and hung up the phone. Okay, what 0:43:13.120 --> 0:43:16.920 is this pilot doing with a Swiss bank account? I 0:43:17.120 --> 0:43:20.280 just knew there was a lot more to the story 0:43:20.840 --> 0:43:24.600 because we still don't know about the Iran Contra connection 0:43:25.040 --> 0:43:27.640 at this point, but we now know there's a Swiss 0:43:27.760 --> 0:43:30.759 bank account that this guy that obviously worked for the 0:43:30.840 --> 0:43:35.040 CIA has access to. So I remember calling Miami, and 0:43:35.080 --> 0:43:38.960 I remember calling New York. I said it may be nothing, 0:43:39.280 --> 0:43:43.040 but I think it's something big, and I explained to 0:43:43.200 --> 0:43:48.480 him what I had. New York and Miami were beyond disbelief. 0:43:48.880 --> 0:43:52.600 What could this possibly be? So at that point, not 0:43:52.880 --> 0:43:56.880 knowing that I had Iran Contra proof, I passed it 0:43:57.080 --> 0:44:01.480 then on to Miami and then obviously New York Foreign Desk, 0:44:01.760 --> 0:44:05.600 and I think that went on to Washington CBS Foreign 0:44:05.640 --> 0:44:08.719 Desk in Washington, let them figure it out. 0:44:09.480 --> 0:44:11.400 About a year later this happened. 0:44:12.000 --> 0:44:15.760 More than two thousand pages of Swiss bank records considered 0:44:15.800 --> 0:44:19.000 crucial to the criminal investigation of the Iran Contra affair 0:44:19.239 --> 0:44:22.640 were turned over in Switzerland yesterday to AIDS to Independent 0:44:22.680 --> 0:44:23.920 Council Lawrence E. 0:44:24.120 --> 0:44:24.480 Walsh. 0:44:24.800 --> 0:44:28.200 The records are expected to provide Walsh's office its first 0:44:28.280 --> 0:44:31.680 direct access to the secret Swiss bank accounts used by 0:44:31.800 --> 0:44:35.920 fired National Security Council AID Lieutenant Colonel Oliver L. North 0:44:36.000 --> 0:44:39.560 and his assistants to divert funds to the Nicaraguan countries 0:44:39.840 --> 0:44:42.400 from the sale of US arms to Iran. 0:44:43.719 --> 0:44:46.880 Now I've got to say, yes, I was a part 0:44:47.120 --> 0:44:50.880 of this blowing the whistle on Iran contra. But there 0:44:50.960 --> 0:44:56.640 were many journalists based in Nicaragua. There were people in Washington. 0:44:57.040 --> 0:44:57.919 In fact, a very. 0:44:57.920 --> 0:45:01.120 Close friend of mine, Leslie Coburn, was at the time 0:45:01.200 --> 0:45:06.120 writing a book about this whole Iran Contra connection. Everybody 0:45:06.239 --> 0:45:08.839 was coming at it from a different angle. People were 0:45:08.880 --> 0:45:11.840 coming at it from different countries. So I want to 0:45:11.880 --> 0:45:15.719 make it quite clear I'm not the only one. Everybody 0:45:15.920 --> 0:45:16.520 was involved. 0:45:17.480 --> 0:45:19.640 So all this goes down. So whatever happened with Sally 0:45:19.760 --> 0:45:20.640 and Eugene. 0:45:20.760 --> 0:45:25.160 Okay, So for the next few months there's the trial. 0:45:25.719 --> 0:45:27.759 Everybody knew it was going to be a sham, that 0:45:27.840 --> 0:45:30.359 he was going to be found guilty and now they've 0:45:30.400 --> 0:45:34.799 got the sixty minutes peace as evidence because he's confessing 0:45:35.360 --> 0:45:36.080 to everything. 0:45:36.520 --> 0:45:40.759 So the trial goes on. It's every day, sweltering heat. 0:45:41.640 --> 0:45:44.440 Sally Hasenfus was just trying to get through it. 0:45:45.600 --> 0:45:49.080 It's hard, it's really hard. We've gone through one trial 0:45:49.160 --> 0:45:52.640 and I think we're looking forward to another trial. Not literally, 0:45:52.960 --> 0:45:56.000 but I think it's something that has to be done. 0:45:56.760 --> 0:45:58.920 We need to get through this, get it over with. 0:46:00.880 --> 0:46:05.400 Senator Christopher Dodd had flown in at some point to 0:46:05.520 --> 0:46:10.880 try to broker Eugene Hazfuz's release with the Sandinistas, and 0:46:11.040 --> 0:46:14.960 I don't think he was getting anywhere the talks were ongoing. 0:46:15.520 --> 0:46:19.960 I don't think he knew where they stood at this particular. 0:46:19.560 --> 0:46:21.040 Moment that we're going to talk about. 0:46:21.480 --> 0:46:26.000 So I get a call before dawn for Mortega's right 0:46:26.080 --> 0:46:29.799 hand guy and he tells me today's the day it's 0:46:29.880 --> 0:46:32.400 going to happen. And I'm like, what's going to happen? 0:46:32.800 --> 0:46:36.320 And he says, you know what I'm talking about, Today's 0:46:36.400 --> 0:46:39.319 the day. So I put down the phone. I call 0:46:39.480 --> 0:46:43.040 Senator Dodd, wake him up. I tell him today's the 0:46:43.120 --> 0:46:44.960 day he's getting out. He goes, what do you mean 0:46:45.440 --> 0:46:48.000 I said, they're letting him out today. Of course, I 0:46:48.120 --> 0:46:50.959 wanted him to feel like he had been the one 0:46:51.320 --> 0:46:55.440 that accomplished the release. I said, whatever you did, whatever 0:46:55.520 --> 0:46:58.800 you said, it worked. They're letting him out today. So 0:46:58.960 --> 0:47:01.680 I hung up with him, and then my final call 0:47:01.880 --> 0:47:05.080 was to Sally hazard Fuchs. I wake her up and 0:47:05.200 --> 0:47:08.240 I said, Sally, hate to wake you up, but today's 0:47:08.320 --> 0:47:08.640 the day. 0:47:08.960 --> 0:47:11.600 What what day? I said, Sally, Remember I. 0:47:11.680 --> 0:47:14.799 Told you that I didn't know when, didn't know how, 0:47:15.360 --> 0:47:17.719 but that you were going to be taking Eugene home. 0:47:18.120 --> 0:47:21.239 She says, yes, I said, today's the day. And do 0:47:21.360 --> 0:47:24.360 you remember the promise you made me? And she says, 0:47:24.680 --> 0:47:28.040 I think so. I said, you promised me that you 0:47:28.200 --> 0:47:30.560 were going to be mine. I'm going to be with 0:47:30.719 --> 0:47:34.080 you the whole day till the release. You speak to 0:47:34.200 --> 0:47:38.240 no one, give you give no interviews, you give no quotes. 0:47:38.800 --> 0:47:40.880 Your mind, she says, Cookie. 0:47:40.920 --> 0:47:46.880 Of course, that was the fateful day that Eugene Hasenfus 0:47:47.480 --> 0:47:51.960 was released. Released It to the care Senator Christopher Dodd 0:47:52.400 --> 0:47:55.600 with his wife by his side, and guess what he 0:47:55.800 --> 0:47:56.440 was going. 0:47:56.320 --> 0:47:57.320 Home for Christmas? 0:47:57.600 --> 0:48:01.879 Mission accomplished, Mission accomplished. Our good friend Stephen Kinzer wrote 0:48:01.920 --> 0:48:03.000 this in the New York Times. 0:48:03.800 --> 0:48:07.800 Eugene Hassenphuss, the American air cargo handler captured when his 0:48:07.960 --> 0:48:11.360 arms laden plane was shot down over Nicaragua in October, 0:48:12.000 --> 0:48:15.480 was pardoned and freed today. Mister Hassenphus, who had been 0:48:15.560 --> 0:48:18.480 sentenced to a thirty year jail term by a Nicaraguan 0:48:18.560 --> 0:48:22.360 people's tribunal, was turned over to Senator Christopher J. Dodd, 0:48:22.680 --> 0:48:25.560 Democrat of Connecticut, and left the country aboard a jet 0:48:25.640 --> 0:48:29.000 with mister Dodd. We want to turn citizen Hausentphus over 0:48:29.080 --> 0:48:32.040 to the American people, and we are doing so through 0:48:32.080 --> 0:48:36.040 the person of Senator Dodd. President Daniel Ortega Savedra said 0:48:36.120 --> 0:48:38.960 as he made the announcement, this is a Christmas and 0:48:39.080 --> 0:48:41.960 New Year message to the American people. It is a 0:48:42.120 --> 0:48:44.040 very concrete message of peace. 0:48:45.520 --> 0:48:47.560 So the whistle was blown. 0:48:48.000 --> 0:48:50.920 I would like to think that I sort of got 0:48:51.000 --> 0:48:55.560 that ball rolling with that Swiss Bank account number. What 0:48:55.760 --> 0:49:00.160 we came to find out was the US government in 0:49:00.360 --> 0:49:04.080 order to finance the contrast, because it's against you know, 0:49:04.239 --> 0:49:06.200 I guess the Geneva Convention. 0:49:05.960 --> 0:49:08.279 To it's against the law. In the United States. They 0:49:08.360 --> 0:49:11.319 passed law saying you can't fund the contrast the. 0:49:11.400 --> 0:49:15.640 Way they went around That is, the US then began 0:49:16.000 --> 0:49:22.120 to secretly sell weapons to our mortal enemy at the time, Iran, 0:49:22.719 --> 0:49:26.840 how crazy is this. We're selling our mortal enemy weapons 0:49:27.280 --> 0:49:30.960 so that we could take that money, invest it and 0:49:31.719 --> 0:49:36.920 finance drug dealers, some of them my friends, working kahoots 0:49:37.000 --> 0:49:41.120 with the DEA to give them the oka to bring 0:49:41.239 --> 0:49:45.240 in crack cocaine into the US so as to make. 0:49:45.520 --> 0:49:49.360 More money to finance this army. 0:49:49.400 --> 0:49:52.879 Known as the Contras, or as Reagan referred to them, 0:49:53.360 --> 0:49:54.719 the freedom fighters. 0:49:55.760 --> 0:49:58.440 I think he really did believe that. But what they 0:49:58.480 --> 0:50:01.000 were doing was illegal, probably a war crime. 0:50:02.280 --> 0:50:05.239 My fellow Americans, I thought long and often about how 0:50:05.320 --> 0:50:08.600 to explain to you what I intended to accomplish the 0:50:08.719 --> 0:50:11.120 fact of the matter is that there's nothing I can 0:50:11.239 --> 0:50:15.240 say that will make the situation right. I was stubborn 0:50:15.400 --> 0:50:18.759 in my pursuit of a policy that went astray. The 0:50:18.840 --> 0:50:21.520 other major issue of the hearings, of course, was the 0:50:21.600 --> 0:50:25.680 diversion of funds to the Nicaraguan Contres. Colonel North and 0:50:25.880 --> 0:50:28.719 Admiral Poindexter believed they were doing what I would have 0:50:28.800 --> 0:50:32.960 wanted done. Yet the buck does not stop with Admiral Poindexter, 0:50:33.040 --> 0:50:36.160 as he stated in his testimony, it stops with me. 0:50:37.200 --> 0:50:39.440 I am the one who is ultimately accountable to the 0:50:39.480 --> 0:50:40.280 American people. 0:50:41.960 --> 0:50:45.160 As I said in the first episode, eleven Reagan administration 0:50:45.280 --> 0:50:48.799 officials were convicted in this scandal, all pardoned when Bush 0:50:48.840 --> 0:50:52.720 took office in nineteen eighty nine, So not much accountability. 0:50:53.760 --> 0:50:56.920 This is Sally hasenfuss on the men and women behind 0:50:56.920 --> 0:50:57.480 the scandal. 0:50:57.800 --> 0:51:01.759 I've found out things through this that are going on 0:51:02.640 --> 0:51:05.920 that are wrong. Some of these people may start out 0:51:05.960 --> 0:51:09.680 on the right foot with the right beliefs. Somewhere along 0:51:09.760 --> 0:51:16.080 the line here money, profit took over. Profit became more 0:51:16.120 --> 0:51:22.839 important than Jean's life, mister Sawyer's life, mister Cooper's life. 0:51:24.560 --> 0:51:27.960 That pretty much sums it up. Were you ever contacted 0:51:28.080 --> 0:51:32.120 by authorities officials to possibly testify. 0:51:32.000 --> 0:51:34.840 Or to Oh, that happened years later once I was 0:51:34.920 --> 0:51:37.480 out of the business and I was back in New 0:51:37.600 --> 0:51:41.200 Orleans trying to lead a quiet normal. 0:51:41.239 --> 0:51:44.400 But it did happen. It happened, And your response I. 0:51:44.440 --> 0:51:47.480 Got whined that they were looking to get me to 0:51:47.640 --> 0:51:52.839 testify before a committee about my knowledge of the US 0:51:53.000 --> 0:51:58.640 government introducing or facilitating the introduction of crack cocaine into 0:51:58.760 --> 0:52:02.880 this country. I just at that point went underground again 0:52:03.239 --> 0:52:06.200 because I'm not going to go and testify against the 0:52:06.400 --> 0:52:08.560 US government and about drugs. 0:52:09.000 --> 0:52:13.440 It did not happen, all right. So Cookie lived somehow 0:52:13.640 --> 0:52:16.600 to tell her story, and what a fucking story it is. 0:52:17.760 --> 0:52:20.560 She has a few more things to say. We'll be 0:52:20.680 --> 0:52:28.319 right back. Welcome back. It's been a hell of a ride. 0:52:29.480 --> 0:52:34.640 Before Cookie finishes telling her story, we have one more guest, 0:52:36.440 --> 0:52:39.600 justin Wolf. You remember the two Lane history professor who 0:52:39.640 --> 0:52:41.439 looks like the bass player from zz Top. 0:52:41.800 --> 0:52:42.919 Hey, Steve, how are you doing? 0:52:43.120 --> 0:52:47.200 How you doing? Resident expert on Nicaraguan history in Central 0:52:47.200 --> 0:52:52.200 America and professor at Tulane University. Oz and Fuz falls 0:52:52.239 --> 0:52:55.040 from the air and changes everything. Tell us about that. 0:52:55.640 --> 0:52:57.880 Yeah, I like that Osiphus falls from the air and 0:52:58.040 --> 0:53:02.760 everything falls apart. I think about Hassamphus. It's like thread 0:53:02.960 --> 0:53:05.720 or pc yarn in the sweater's just kind of starting 0:53:05.800 --> 0:53:08.000 to come out, you know. And I think the Reagan 0:53:08.040 --> 0:53:11.759 administration and everyone involved like, just pull that and clip 0:53:11.800 --> 0:53:14.920 it off and will be done. But they kept pulling 0:53:15.120 --> 0:53:18.880 and pulling, and the whole thing just fell apart. I 0:53:18.920 --> 0:53:22.799 think in Nicaragua, Hassimphos was just like icing on the cake. 0:53:23.160 --> 0:53:26.879 It just confirmed everything that they already knew. I think 0:53:27.000 --> 0:53:29.839 for the Sandinistas, it was really hard to figure out 0:53:30.040 --> 0:53:33.560 where an end game could come. I think that they 0:53:33.680 --> 0:53:36.880 really wanted to gain the moral high ground, and Hassimphus 0:53:37.000 --> 0:53:39.600 gave them an opportunity to do that. I think for 0:53:39.719 --> 0:53:44.560 Nicaragua that's really the primary consequence. It gave them breathing room. 0:53:44.760 --> 0:53:48.759 It shifted the focus in the US back to kind 0:53:48.760 --> 0:53:52.239 of the US government playing the kind of cold war 0:53:52.360 --> 0:53:56.160 games that it had long been doing, and allowed them 0:53:56.520 --> 0:53:59.600 to come back in the US, if not as the 0:53:59.680 --> 0:54:03.800 good guy, at least as the beleaguered small nation that 0:54:03.880 --> 0:54:04.239 they were. 0:54:04.920 --> 0:54:07.640 What do you think Iran Contra ranks in the big 0:54:07.719 --> 0:54:10.880 scandals of the recent Hey, the last fifty years. You 0:54:10.960 --> 0:54:14.440 have Iron Contra, you have Trump Russia, you have Watergate, you. 0:54:14.520 --> 0:54:18.040 Have January sixth, January sixth. Where does it rank in 0:54:18.239 --> 0:54:22.560 terms of the effort and its illegality and how deeply 0:54:22.680 --> 0:54:25.920 it went. It's actually one of the worst. Right when 0:54:25.920 --> 0:54:30.080 you think about Watergate, I mean it was small potatoes, right, 0:54:30.239 --> 0:54:32.239 a break in. You know, they always say it's never 0:54:32.320 --> 0:54:35.240 the crime, it's the cover up this It was the crime. 0:54:35.640 --> 0:54:38.719 The CIA is breaking the law. The Reagan administration all 0:54:38.840 --> 0:54:41.160 up and down the chain is breaking the law. 0:54:41.320 --> 0:54:42.400 And they knew it right. 0:54:42.480 --> 0:54:43.840 They thought, we're the executive. 0:54:44.080 --> 0:54:44.759 We know best. 0:54:45.080 --> 0:54:47.960 These guys are, you know, either fools or pansies or 0:54:48.000 --> 0:54:50.120 whatever it is, and we're just going to do what 0:54:50.280 --> 0:54:51.000 needs to be done. 0:54:52.560 --> 0:54:55.480 There is one person that we haven't talked too much 0:54:55.520 --> 0:54:58.680 about in this podcast. Tell me about your daughter. 0:54:59.360 --> 0:55:04.320 Well, Ellie Lexandra very special. She and Chicho, who you 0:55:04.440 --> 0:55:07.719 guys all know, were ten years apart, and she was 0:55:07.800 --> 0:55:12.479 born after our story is told. A second child being 0:55:12.680 --> 0:55:18.320 raised in a war zone definitely unique, dangerous, not easy. 0:55:19.040 --> 0:55:21.279 I've never thought about it in this way, but I 0:55:21.400 --> 0:55:24.880 can say it now. Having my two kids with me 0:55:25.360 --> 0:55:29.120 during these hard times was a life at vest being 0:55:29.239 --> 0:55:35.560 thrown out to me. When things would be dark, horrible, heinous, unthinkable. 0:55:35.840 --> 0:55:39.120 I could always go back to my hotel, to my 0:55:39.239 --> 0:55:41.360 living quarters, and there were my children. 0:55:41.800 --> 0:55:43.320 How does she feel about the podcast? 0:55:43.680 --> 0:55:45.360 She loves it. 0:55:45.760 --> 0:55:47.840 At first, I was a little scared that it was 0:55:47.880 --> 0:55:50.359 going to be a little too much for because she's 0:55:50.400 --> 0:55:52.320 a little more conservative. 0:55:52.040 --> 0:55:52.640 Than I am. 0:55:53.200 --> 0:55:57.000 But she has just relished in the fact that her 0:55:57.080 --> 0:56:00.239 mom did all these things, and I'm going to taking 0:56:00.280 --> 0:56:03.360 a step further. She's proud of mommy and she tells 0:56:03.440 --> 0:56:05.560 me so every single day. 0:56:06.480 --> 0:56:11.400 So we've just done nine episodes of the Journalist of Podcasts. 0:56:11.480 --> 0:56:12.200 How does that feel? 0:56:13.040 --> 0:56:17.680 At once exhilarating because the job is done, But at 0:56:17.719 --> 0:56:22.680 the same time, I'm quite sad because the job is done. 0:56:23.000 --> 0:56:25.840 The people that we've worked with, all the people that 0:56:25.960 --> 0:56:30.760 have been on the podcast, my former colleagues, my still friends, 0:56:31.760 --> 0:56:34.600 it's a sad feeling for me personally. 0:56:35.360 --> 0:56:37.719 Was it fun getting to know them again in a 0:56:37.760 --> 0:56:38.279 different way? 0:56:38.719 --> 0:56:39.279 Yes and no. 0:56:40.280 --> 0:56:42.920 For so many years I kept a lot of these 0:56:43.040 --> 0:56:48.799 bad memories buried deep down for obvious reasons, PTSD all 0:56:48.880 --> 0:56:52.359 of that. So working with you bringing up all those 0:56:52.400 --> 0:56:56.360 stories again has obviously brought up the PTSD again, some 0:56:56.520 --> 0:57:00.440 bad memories, bad feelings. But touching base again with my 0:57:00.960 --> 0:57:06.920 band of brothers has just been wonderful. When you have people, friends, 0:57:07.040 --> 0:57:12.400 colleagues that you go through these imminent death experiences also 0:57:12.560 --> 0:57:16.080 some fun experiences, you don't let that go. We were 0:57:16.120 --> 0:57:19.280 a band of brothers then, we're a band of brothers now, 0:57:19.840 --> 0:57:22.439 and we will be a band of brothers till we die. 0:57:23.720 --> 0:57:28.360 Now, with the benefit of history and taking this journey 0:57:28.920 --> 0:57:31.840 through your life and the podcast, how do you feel 0:57:31.880 --> 0:57:35.120 about your life then, the world you were part of, 0:57:35.360 --> 0:57:37.040 and how does it apply to you now? 0:57:38.360 --> 0:57:40.720 I think the way I look at it now. First, 0:57:41.400 --> 0:57:44.920 I'm lucky that I survived it. No shit, it was 0:57:45.000 --> 0:57:48.720 an honor to do what I did with the people 0:57:48.840 --> 0:57:51.720 that I did it with and the audience that I 0:57:51.800 --> 0:57:56.480 did it for. If I was a badass warrior bish 0:57:57.200 --> 0:58:00.840 back then, if I was a bad ass as warrior 0:58:00.960 --> 0:58:02.720 bish back then. 0:58:02.800 --> 0:58:03.560 You're saying bish. 0:58:03.880 --> 0:58:05.800 Yeah, that's the new way of saying bitch. 0:58:06.480 --> 0:58:06.760 Fuck. 0:58:06.880 --> 0:58:07.680 I didn't even know that. 0:58:07.960 --> 0:58:11.760 Yeah, you don't say bitch anymore because, OK, so you 0:58:11.840 --> 0:58:12.280 say bitch. 0:58:12.360 --> 0:58:14.680 Do you want me to not say no, just bitch? 0:58:14.880 --> 0:58:15.400 Just start over. 0:58:15.480 --> 0:58:17.280 I'm sorry. I just hadn't heard. I thought you were 0:58:17.360 --> 0:58:18.600 like having some sort of tongue twister. 0:58:18.920 --> 0:58:22.840 No, that's how you say bitch without disrespecting a woman. 0:58:23.200 --> 0:58:25.640 Damn, I'm so disrespectful. Then go ahead. 0:58:25.880 --> 0:58:30.200 So it took me being a fierce badass bish back 0:58:30.280 --> 0:58:35.200 then to reminding me that I'm still a fierce badass 0:58:35.280 --> 0:58:40.240 bish now. I may not be doing the dangerous memorable 0:58:40.360 --> 0:58:43.959 things that I used to do. But I can see 0:58:44.600 --> 0:58:48.000 the end result of a lot that I did back then. 0:58:48.920 --> 0:58:52.440 You know, we've been getting messages and comments from women 0:58:52.920 --> 0:58:55.880 all over the world and they're saying you're an inspiration. 0:58:56.320 --> 0:58:58.280 How does that make you feel and what do you 0:58:58.320 --> 0:58:59.000 think that means? 0:58:59.440 --> 0:59:03.680 Well, obviously it makes me feel good, and I'm grateful, 0:59:04.120 --> 0:59:08.080 especially to you, for helping me get that story out 0:59:08.160 --> 0:59:15.760 there to where we can influence and help change women's lives. 0:59:16.800 --> 0:59:19.800 Nobody's better than the other person, as you and I 0:59:19.920 --> 0:59:22.560 have come to realize, and of course that's the way 0:59:22.640 --> 0:59:26.840 we think. If we just change one person's life, I 0:59:26.920 --> 0:59:29.160 think we've accomplished what we've set out to do. 0:59:30.720 --> 0:59:33.400 You might remember Cookie called the search for war footage 0:59:33.680 --> 0:59:38.240 Looking for Bang Bang. Chuck Gomez, former CBS News correspondent 0:59:38.360 --> 0:59:41.320 and forever friend of Cookie, wrote a play about his 0:59:41.440 --> 0:59:44.160 time in Central America, The Bang Bang Blues. 0:59:44.920 --> 0:59:49.080 It's about a reporter who's stratening to cover the war 0:59:49.320 --> 0:59:51.800 in the midst of these confers arriving and in the 0:59:51.920 --> 0:59:55.960 end he becomes the casualty of the war himself. At 0:59:56.000 --> 0:59:58.680 the very beginning of the play, there's a song Now 0:59:58.720 --> 1:00:01.320 I can't sing, but it's something like this. I got 1:00:01.480 --> 1:00:06.240 the Bang Bang blues wearing out my shoes, sitting dusty 1:00:06.440 --> 1:00:10.400 highways for the network news. I got the Bang Bang blues. 1:00:10.880 --> 1:00:15.240 I'm paying my blues, taking big chances, and I hope 1:00:15.280 --> 1:00:16.200 I don't lose. 1:00:16.920 --> 1:00:17.479 Oh yeah. 1:00:18.800 --> 1:00:21.240 I want to give a shout out to journalists everywhere 1:00:21.400 --> 1:00:24.920 for giving so much, including their lives, in the pursuit 1:00:24.960 --> 1:00:27.440 of truth around the world. It can be a very 1:00:27.560 --> 1:00:30.400 dangerous calling, and we can't thank you enough for what 1:00:30.520 --> 1:00:34.200 you do in these crazy times. We need you now 1:00:34.440 --> 1:00:37.080 more than ever. Before we go, I just want to 1:00:37.120 --> 1:00:40.200 say something. I've known Cookie for a long time. She 1:00:40.400 --> 1:00:45.560 is one of a kind, generous, loving, courageous, hilarious, insane, 1:00:46.320 --> 1:00:49.880 the lover of animals and collector of amazing people. It's 1:00:49.920 --> 1:00:51.760 been one of the great honors of my life to 1:00:51.840 --> 1:00:54.840 help bring her story to you. I hope you've enjoyed 1:00:54.880 --> 1:00:59.160 it as much as I have. Thanks for listening. The 1:00:59.240 --> 1:01:02.840 Journalist of pot Cast features the stories and voice Cookie Hood, 1:01:03.600 --> 1:01:08.440 narrated by Steven step produced by Sean J. Donnelly. Executive 1:01:08.480 --> 1:01:13.640 producers Jason Wagetsback, Ellen Ka and Roy Laughlin. iHeart executive 1:01:13.640 --> 1:01:18.280 producer Tyler Klang, Written and edited by Steven step Music 1:01:18.360 --> 1:01:22.560 by Jay Weigel, Associate producer in sound design Stephen Tanti. 1:01:23.160 --> 1:01:27.440 Sound mixing by Jesse Sallon Snyder guest sound mixer, Jack Mealy, 1:01:28.040 --> 1:01:33.120 Web design and social media coordinator Sarah Rodolpho. Special guests 1:01:33.880 --> 1:01:40.920 Jane Wallace, Stephen Kinzer, George Boza, Alejandro Belly Manny Alvarez, 1:01:41.560 --> 1:01:48.320 Chuck Gomez, Carla Ferrell, John Basco, Patrick Hood, Lou Demetaeus, 1:01:49.040 --> 1:01:54.640 Joe Frazier, and Tulaine history professor Justin Woolf. Podcast includes 1:01:54.720 --> 1:02:00.280 the voices of Lloyd scherr, Ellen k Cindy Pohle, Rachel Wan, 1:02:00.720 --> 1:02:06.080 Casey Groves, Pablo Sovalla, Jose Torres, Thomas, and Stephen Tonti. 1:02:07.360 --> 1:02:10.080 Thanks to the talented New Orleans Dream team of musicians 1:02:10.440 --> 1:02:15.080 that contributed to our score Shane Terrio guitar, Doug Below drums, 1:02:15.480 --> 1:02:21.800 Alexe Martis percussion, Beaux Saint Pierre keyboards, Alan Maxwell bass, 1:02:22.440 --> 1:02:26.680 and Dana b violin. Also Lindsay ze Orski composer assistant. 1:02:27.400 --> 1:02:31.640 And a very special thanks to Beth Anne Macaluso, Will 1:02:31.720 --> 1:02:35.960 Pearson and Alison Kantor Graber from My Heart Radio. Jason Gerwitz, 1:02:36.880 --> 1:02:43.960 Christoph SAPARi, Kyle Frederick, Zach Slap, Jacob Meyer, Misha kashkash Ishveli. 1:02:44.800 --> 1:02:48.400 I also want to thank CBS News, sixty Minutes West, 1:02:48.440 --> 1:02:54.680 fifty seven, ABC News, NBC News, CNN, PBS, the BBC, 1:02:55.440 --> 1:02:58.400 The New York Times, The Washington Post, the Miami Herald, 1:02:58.880 --> 1:03:03.000 the Los Angeles Times, the Associated Press, Fox Television, and FX. 1:03:06.320 --> 1:03:10.240 This is a production of Journalista podcast LLC and iHeartRadio