April 7, 2025 • 48 mins
How the Reagan administration landed in a hostage crisis…and extended a hand to one of America’s sworn enemies.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:16):
Pushkin. Hey Leon here, Before we get to this episode,
I want to let you know that you can binge
the entire season of Fiasco Iran Contra right now, add
free by becoming a Pushkin Plus subscriber. Sign up for
Pushkin Plus on the Fiasco Apple podcast show page, or
visit Pushkin dot Fm slash Plus. Now onto the show.
Speaker 2 (00:49):
Ronald Reagan makes his debut.
Speaker 3 (00:50):
Today is America's leading map.
Speaker 1 (00:57):
On the morning of January twentieth, nineteen eighty one, the
White House was preparing for the arrival of a new president,
but some unfinished business was threatening to overshadow the festivities.
Speaker 4 (01:07):
I Reagan may be the first president the day's top
news story on his inauguration day.
Speaker 3 (01:13):
There's Angxiat that hangs over everything.
Speaker 5 (01:15):
This whole business of the hostages.
Speaker 1 (01:19):
This whole business of the hostages referred to more than
fifty American citizens who were being held prisoner in Iran.
They had been there for more than a year, locked
inside the US Embassy in Tehran by a group of
young radicals.
Speaker 6 (01:32):
The US Embassy in Tehran has been invaded and occupied
by Iranian students.
Speaker 7 (01:36):
The American hostages were blindfolded, handcuffed, and marched out on
the US Embassy's front steps by the revolutionary students. The
Iranians had fought US Marine guards for three hours for
control of the embassy.
Speaker 1 (01:48):
The hostage crisis started in November of nineteen seventy nine.
Iran had just undergone a revolution a few months earlier.
The Shah, Iran's long serving US backed leader had been
overthrown and exiled. Islamic fundamentalists who called America the Great
Satan had taken power. American news networks reported that Iran's
new Supreme Leader, the Ayatola Rujuola Komeni, had given the
(02:11):
hostage takers his blessing.
Speaker 6 (02:13):
The move has the Iola's personal support, which adds to
Washington's difficulty in trying to resolve this dangerous situation.
Speaker 1 (02:21):
President Jimmy Carter tried to pressure Iran into releasing the hostages.
His administration cut diplomatic ties with the Komeni government, and
they froze Iranian state assets in US banks. Carter even
authorized the secret rescue mission, but it ended in disaster.
Speaker 2 (02:37):
Thousands of jubile and Iranians gathered outside to celebrate the
defeat and disgrace of America.
Speaker 8 (02:42):
The United States tried to free the hostages and failed.
Speaker 1 (02:45):
None of the hostages were released, and eight American servicemen
were killed in a helicopter crash. The failed mission made
Carter look hapless and ineffective, and the crisis continued. Americans
turned on their televisions for nightly updates. Walter Cronkite began
signing off at the end of every broadcast by noting
the number of days the Americans had been held captive.
Speaker 3 (03:06):
That's the word it is. Tuesday, February nineteenth, nineteen eighty
undred and eighth day of captivity, two hundred and twenty
second day of captivity, three hundred and seventy seventh day
of captivity for American hostages.
Speaker 1 (03:17):
Inter rat Carter's efforts to win the hostages release stretched
into his re election campaign.
Speaker 9 (03:22):
The Republicans are itching to turn the hostage crisis against
the administration.
Speaker 2 (03:27):
The administration has boxed it so bad that we're left
with very few options.
Speaker 10 (03:30):
The hostage issue hovered over the whole campaign, and it
was something that just so damaged Carter.
Speaker 1 (03:38):
That's journalist Jane Mayer, who covered the Reagan administration for
The Wall Street Journal and co authored the book Landslide.
Speaker 10 (03:45):
And the idea of Carter being weak was really the
thing that was hammered over and over again and played
a big part in why he lost.
Speaker 1 (03:58):
Reagan's inauguration in nineteen eighty one marked the four hundred
and forty fourth day of the hostage crisis. The outgoing
Carter administration had hoped it would be the last.
Speaker 5 (04:07):
This has been quite a suspense evening.
Speaker 10 (04:10):
Jimmy Carter, his last night in the White House, spent
it in the Oval Office working with his aids.
Speaker 1 (04:16):
The day before, they had notified the press that a
deal had been reached to finally free the Americans, but
the hostages were still not home.
Speaker 10 (04:25):
In the United States to be Carter.
Speaker 1 (04:28):
At the inauguration ceremony, Carter walked to the dais where
Reagan was about to be sworn in. Even then, reporters
were yelling out to him for confirmation that the hostages
were being released.
Speaker 11 (04:39):
Whether you could hear or not.
Speaker 12 (04:40):
The President at Carter, which just passed if the hostagers
are out, and he responded saying not yet, not yet.
Speaker 1 (04:50):
The Iranians were not going to release the hostages on
Carter's watch. They waited until after Reagan was sworn in.
Before allowing them to leave Tehran. As Carter traveled home
to Georgia, Reagan got to announce the good news.
Speaker 13 (05:04):
Some thirty minutes ago.
Speaker 12 (05:07):
The planes bearing our prison left Iranian airspace and are
now breathed.
Speaker 2 (05:16):
But it had been a wrenching day for mister Carter,
and aide said he had been terribly hurt and disappointed
when he was not able to announce the release of
the hostages before leaving alf Us this morning.
Speaker 10 (05:28):
The simultaneous inauguration of Reagan and the hostages getting out
enabled him to take full credit for it and sort
of appear to be the savior.
Speaker 1 (05:38):
A week later, Reagan welcomed the hostages home in a
ceremony in the Rose.
Speaker 5 (05:42):
Gardens at the White House, a welcome fit for a king,
a kind of South Lawn ceremony usually reserved for visiting.
Speaker 13 (05:48):
Heads of states.
Speaker 12 (05:52):
Welcome home, you are home, and believe me, you are welcome.
Speaker 1 (05:59):
But the triumphant moment also created a liability for the
Reagan administration.
Speaker 10 (06:03):
It so publicly associated them with this act that it
upped the anti for Reagan. He was more vulnerable than
maybe other presidents would have been to being manipulated on
the issue because he'd made this sort of his selling point.
Speaker 1 (06:18):
Later, one of Reagan's counter terrorism analysts expressed regret over
the spectacle. Where did we first go wrong? Nineteen eighty one?
He said, once we had the Rose Garden ceremony, we
had attached huge political benefits to the return of US hostages.
In other words, Reagan had set himself up for a
potential hostage crisis of his own. I'm Leon Nevak from
(06:42):
Prolog Projects and Pushkin Industries. This is fiasco iran contrast.
Speaker 14 (06:47):
Seven Americans kidnapped over the past fifteen months, seven Americans
who have disappeared.
Speaker 15 (06:53):
The Reagan administration's response to the series of kidnappings has
been one of almost total silence.
Speaker 16 (06:57):
They did not want to have a hostage problem like
Jimmy Carter has.
Speaker 10 (07:01):
Maybe they can get the hostages out.
Speaker 1 (07:03):
I can't assure you that no deal was made.
Speaker 6 (07:05):
The impression left by all of this is that things
are afoot.
Speaker 17 (07:07):
The only person that could have stopped me, and I
didn't do it.
Speaker 1 (07:16):
Episode two, Trade Secrets how Ronald Reagan tried to avoid
Jimmy Carter's fate by extending a hand to one of
America's sworn enemies. We'll be right back. Among the advisors
(07:38):
and aides who joined Ronald Reagan in the White House
was a soft spoken and cerebral retired Marine named Robert
Bud McFarlane. McFarlane's domain was foreign policy. As a student
at the US Naval Academy, he had longed to have
a hand in shaping America's relationship to the rest of
the world.
Speaker 17 (07:56):
And I had to think with all the rigor I
could muster about the elements of power and their nature
and their limits.
Speaker 1 (08:06):
This is Bud McFarlane speaking to me in December of
twe nineteen in Washington, DC.
Speaker 13 (08:12):
All that is not unique to me.
Speaker 17 (08:14):
I mean, hundreds thousands of people go through as good
or better schools than I did and get this foundation
knowledge and self confidence that, yes, you can contribute constructively
because you know the rules and you occasionally have a
lucid interval and even imagination that could make the world
(08:37):
a better place.
Speaker 1 (08:38):
Bud McFarland died in twenty twenty two at the age
of eighty four. Perhaps more than anyone else in the
Reagan White House, McFarlane felt personally responsible for the events
that led to Iran Contra. When I first approached him
about an interview. He made it clear that rehashing the
story of the scandal would be painful.
Speaker 17 (08:58):
Remorse doesn't quite capture it. I I'd failed my country.
Speaker 1 (09:07):
McFarlane's career in government began during that Nickson administration, when
he worked for Henry Kissinger.
Speaker 4 (09:13):
Henry Kissinger has been on the road conferring, negotiating, and
meeting with heads of state in eight countries in nine days.
Speaker 1 (09:19):
McFarlane saw Kissinger as a professional role model, an ambitious
geopolitical thinker who could see the vulnerabilities of America's adversaries
and knew how to exploit them.
Speaker 4 (09:29):
Kissinger carried out his Middle East peace mission today in
three Arab countries.
Speaker 2 (09:33):
He's the most gifted man to work in American foreign
policy in any generation since World War Two.
Speaker 17 (09:40):
Henry was someone who I had admired, notwithstanding his cynicism
and occasionally ruthless methods, and being there even as a
note taker was a.
Speaker 13 (09:56):
Gift.
Speaker 1 (09:58):
In nineteen eighty three, just days before the invasion of Grenada,
Reagan made McFarlane his National Security Advisor, the same job
Henry Kissinger had held a decade earlier.
Speaker 12 (10:09):
Robert McFarlane, we'll be confirmed as National Security Advisor, but
I want to thank you for accepting this new challenge.
All of us look forward to working with you in
the coming months.
Speaker 1 (10:23):
From the beginning of his tenure as National Security Advisor,
McFarlan had a special interest in Iran. He believed that
even though Iran was led by the intensely anti American
Iatola Komani, the US might have a chance to intervene
in the country's politics.
Speaker 9 (10:38):
Conscious of iran strategic and economic importance, the administration wants
to keep the door open to possible reconciliation. But while
Comte lives, that seems a distant hope.
Speaker 17 (10:48):
I really didn't imagine that we had a plausible prospect
of being able to engage with this government. I did think, however,
that there were reasons why the circumstances facing Iran might
give us an opportunity to influence the regime change.
Speaker 1 (11:12):
McFarlane had this theory that there might be people inside
the Iranian military who would be amenable to the idea
of a coup against Komani. Theoretically, the Americans could help
these dissident elements and in the process turn Iran from
an enemy into an ally. The way they had been
before the revolution.
Speaker 17 (11:31):
I mean, you'd have to have the very senior leadership
of the military who had become demoralized. And that's theory,
but it was a very plausible possibility that the military
would be the instrument of changing the regime in a
relatively bloodless coup.
Speaker 1 (11:51):
MacFarlane had a specific reason for thinking that Iran was
vulnerable to an internal coup. As he saw it, the
country was stuck between two foreign powers, Iraq to the
west and the Soviet Union to the northeast. In Iraq,
the problem was Saddam Hussein, who had invaded Iran in
nineteen eighty right after the Iranian Revolution. The war that
(12:12):
followed was unimaginably violent. Hundreds of thousands of people were
being killed.
Speaker 14 (12:17):
A war that started months ago with fretful skirm issues,
a war that no one now seems able to stop.
Speaker 1 (12:26):
Meanwhile, the Soviet Union was just sort of looming over Iran.
Speaker 13 (12:30):
On its northern border.
Speaker 9 (12:31):
Iran worries about twenty four Soviet divisions.
Speaker 1 (12:34):
The two countries shared a border, and MacFarland had no
doubt that the Soviets, who had recently invaded Afghanistan, wanted
to gain influence in the Middle East. He thought maybe
there were people within the Iranian leadership who were concerned
about the same thing.
Speaker 17 (12:48):
Out of self interest. That ought to have nurtured a
dissonant element.
Speaker 1 (12:58):
There was just one problem. McFarlane didn't actually know for
sure that these dissidents existed. He was thinking strategically, just
like Kissinger had taught him, and he was hoping to
be fair. There wasn't much else he could do. Concrete
intelligence about what was happening in the Iranian government was
very hard to come by. The relationship between Iran and
(13:20):
the US was openly hostile.
Speaker 8 (13:22):
Leading officials of the Reagan administration repeatedly have accused Iran
of sponsoring terrorist attacks against the United States.
Speaker 1 (13:30):
In nineteen eighty four, the Reagan administration officially designated the
Komani regime a state sponsor of terrorism. They enforced an
arms embargo that prevented the US government from selling weapons
to Iran, and launched a diplomatic campaign to pressure other
countries to do the same.
Speaker 9 (13:45):
The burning of the American flag, the shouts of Death
to America.
Speaker 1 (13:50):
Friday prayers, Iranian imams led chance of death to America.
So it was Chile between the Reagan White House and
the Komani regime. But then in July of nineteen eighty five,
Bud McFarlane received a visit from a trusted associate bearing
good news. It turned out that the people mc farland
(14:10):
had been imagining the dissidents within the Iranian regime were
in fact real and they wanted to talk. Around the
same time, a related crisis was unfolding in the Middle East.
Speaker 5 (14:27):
The American University of Beirut today is under heavier guard
than usual. The US Embassy there, citing intelligence reports, has
warned that pro Iranian extremists are planning mass kidnappings of
Americans on the campus.
Speaker 1 (14:39):
John Weir was in his twenties when his father was
taken hostage in Lebanon.
Speaker 16 (14:43):
I remember talking to my sisters and my sisters being upset,
my mom being very upset.
Speaker 1 (14:49):
It was six months into Bud McFarland's tenure as National
Security Advisor, and about three years since the American hostages
taken in Tehran were returned home. John Weir's father, the
Reverend Benjamin Weir, was a Presbyterian minister who had been
assigned to Beirut, the capital city of Lebanon. Weir was
kidnapped as he and his wife Carol were leaving them apartment.
Speaker 16 (15:11):
And not too far from the anxious department building, a
car pulled up, some guys got out and grabbed my dad.
My mom tried to fight them off, She's not much
of a fighter, and they basically just muzzled him into
the car and drove off.
Speaker 1 (15:28):
In the nineteen eighties, Lebanon was embroiled in a brutal
sectarian civil war, and Islamic militia groups began kidnapping European
and American citizens. The group that captured Benjamin Weir was
associated with Hesbela, which enjoyed the support of the Komani
regime in Iran. By nineteen eighty five, Weir was one
of seven Americans being held hostage in Lebanon.
Speaker 14 (15:50):
Seven Americans kidnapped in Beirut over the past fifteen months,
seven Americans who have disappeared.
Speaker 1 (15:56):
In addition to Weir, the group of hostages included a
Catholic priest, a correspondent for the Associated Press, and three
employees of the American University in Beirut. In the federal government,
administration officials were most co earned, with one hostage in particular,
a CIA operative named William Buckley.
Speaker 5 (16:15):
William Buckley, a political officer at the US Embassy in Beirut,
was kidnapped.
Speaker 4 (16:19):
He was kidnapped on March the sixteenth, nineteen eighty four.
Speaker 1 (16:23):
Buckley had been with the CIA for decades, working in Zayir, Cambodia, Egypt,
and Pakistan. When he was kidnapped, Buckley was the head
of the CIA's be Route Division, though that was not
public information at the time. News outlets identified him only
as a political officer at the US Embassy. In January
of nineteen eighty five, Buckley's captors released a videotape of
(16:45):
him to prove that he was still alive.
Speaker 15 (16:49):
January nineteen, page five Hi as well.
Speaker 1 (16:55):
In the video, Buckley appeared weak and his voice sounded thin.
Intelligence officials feared that the kidnappers were torturing him in
order to get CIA's secrets. As Buckley's captivity stretched into
its second year, it weighed on the minds of administration
officials like McFarlane, CIA Director William Casey and President Reagan himself,
(17:16):
But the administration seemed to be avoiding drawing attention to
the hostage situation as much as possible.
Speaker 15 (17:21):
The Reagan administration's response to the series of kidnappings has
been one of almost total silence. What a complete contrast
to the actions of the Carter administration when Iranian extremists
seized the American embassy in Tehran more than five years ago.
Speaker 1 (17:35):
Here again is John Weir.
Speaker 16 (17:37):
The Reagan White House had made a lot of political
hay out of Jimmy Carter's issues with the hostages in Iran,
and it was pretty clear to us that they were
kind of suppressing as much as they could discussion of
hostages or use of the word hostages, and they did
(17:58):
not want to have a hostage problem like Jimmy Carter had.
Speaker 1 (18:01):
The administration had also publicly committed itself to an ironclad
principle America does not negotiate with terrorists.
Speaker 12 (18:09):
Terrorists and those who support them must and will be
held to account.
Speaker 10 (18:15):
The principle was that, you know, we should never deal
with terrorists.
Speaker 1 (18:19):
Here's Jane Mayer again, that you.
Speaker 10 (18:21):
Do not honor them by dealing with them, and they
took a very hard line on it.
Speaker 1 (18:27):
The Reagan administration communicated a consistent message to the Weir family,
just laylo, the government is doing everything it can. They
even had a phrase for it, quiet diplomacy.
Speaker 16 (18:38):
Quiet diplomacy was their explanation of why we had no
idea what they were doing. We would say, so, what
are you doing, Oh, well, we're using quiet diplomacy.
Speaker 1 (18:50):
Eventually, Benjamin Weir's wife, Carol took matters into her own hands.
She had lived in Lebanon for more than thirty years
and she knew a lot of people. She began traveling
around the region talking to religious leaders, following leads of
her own, and comparing notes with her contacts at the
US embassy.
Speaker 16 (19:07):
She would ask them, you know, who have you seen?
And there were a couple of occasions when they mentioned
some people and she said, well, I've already seen that person. So,
you know, she started trying to figure out who had them,
what was going on, what did they want. But after
we'd heard quiet diplomacy long enough, we decided that the
(19:28):
quiet diplomacy was just a way of trying to pacify us,
and that we needed to ratchet things up.
Speaker 1 (19:36):
Finally, Carol Weir decided that she needed to relocate to
the United States and take her message to Washington.
Speaker 4 (19:44):
The wife of the Reverend Benjamin Weir was in Washington
today seeking more help for her husband.
Speaker 18 (19:49):
It's four hundred and seventeen days now for me since
my husband was kidnapped. As that's a long time, and
I believe they have been forgotten.
Speaker 1 (20:00):
The Weirs used the resources of the Presbyterian Church to
launch a public pressure campaign. They spoke at churches and
gave press conferences. They organized an effort to get a
milli letters written to the administration. In one speech, Carol
Weir invoked the Iranian hostage crisis that had consumed the
nation's attention just a few years earlier. She asked if
(20:20):
she would have to wait four hundred and forty four
days to see her husband. During his first term, Reagan's
closest aids had tried to prevent the president from directly
engaging with the hostage families.
Speaker 10 (20:35):
The old aides who knew him well, tried to keep
people with hard luck stories away from him. That is
the truth about Reagan was that whenever there was somebody
who was an individual with a problem that was near him,
he had a tendency to be empathetic and he could
be manipulated.
Speaker 1 (20:52):
Reagan's minders had feared that if he met with the
hostage families, he would begin pushing to get their loved
ones released at any cost, and he might be tempted
to violate his policy of never negotiating with terrorists. But
by the summer of nineteen eighty five, many of Reagan's
first term aids were no longer around. Without them there
to hold him back, the President began to fixate on
(21:14):
the hostages, asking about them in meetings nearly every day
and agonizing over their continued captivity.
Speaker 10 (21:20):
He basically got drawn in and hooked and became emotionally
involved in the situation, and he made clear that he
cared and he really wanted these hostages out and something
done about it. And his motto, which he often said
to his aides, was don't bring me problems, bring me solutions.
Speaker 1 (21:40):
In July of nineteen eighty five, National security advisor Bud
McFarlane approached the President with a possible solution. In his diary,
Reagan wrote, some strange soundings are coming from the Iranians.
Bud em will be here tomorrow to talk about it.
It could be a breakthrough on getting our seven kidnap
victims back. McFarland's meeting with Reagan was prompted by a
(22:02):
conversation he had had two weeks earlier with a senior
Israeli diplomat. The diplomat's name was David kim k He
had previously served as deputy director of Masad, Israel's intelligence agency,
and MacFarland trusted his judgment. According to MacFarlane, kim Key
told him that Israel had been in touch with Iranians
(22:23):
who were disaffected by the turmoil in their country and
who were both willing and able to change the government.
Speaker 17 (22:30):
It was simply stated that there are elements in the
Iranian army that are prepared to open a dialogue with
us that might lead to oh regime change, but that
it would take probably years of nurture to do it.
(22:51):
I was simply heartened, however, by the fact that he
thought it might be nurtured and developed over time.
Speaker 1 (22:59):
It was exactly what MacFarlane had hoped for, Iranian moderates
and positions of power who secretly opposed the revolutionary government
that had taken over their country. There was a catch.
The coup was not going to nurture itself before there
could be any dialogue between the US and these Iranian moderates.
(23:20):
The Americans would have to do Their new friends a
good turn, they would have to sell them some weapons. Specifically,
the Iranians wanted anti tank missiles for use in their
war against Iraq. It was a big request, but the
Iranians were offering something valuable in return. They could use
their influence over HESBLA to bring about the release of
(23:42):
William Buckley, Benjamin Weir, and all the other American hostages
being held in Lebanon. At least that's what Bud McFarlane
was hearing from David Kimke, the Israeli diplomat.
Speaker 17 (23:54):
Kim k presented it as their being able to achieve
the release of the hostages, and that wasn't just his notion,
but that it had been vetted by Iranians that he
believed were worthy people.
Speaker 1 (24:13):
How did David Kimki know they were worthy people? The
answer lay with the man who was helping Israel make
contact with the Iranian moderates. His name was Menu chair
Goorbanifar Orbanifar was an Iranian businessman living in Europe. He
was a kind of international fixer, a guy who helped
(24:34):
broker deals between parties who would otherwise have no reason
to trust each other. And according to David kimk Gorbanifar
could connect the Americans to the moderates inside Iran who
were open, perhaps even eager, for a better relationship with
the United States. If this all sounds convoluted, that's because
it was McFarlane, kimky goor Bonifar, these nameless moderates in Iran.
(24:58):
It's a bizarre daisy chain, and the mechanics of it
aren't that important. The point is a guy knew a
guy who knew a guy who claimed to know some
high level Iranians who didn't see eye to eye with
the anti American and Comani regime. Incredibly, that was enough
to get the ball rolling. Over the course of several weeks.
(25:20):
In July, a specific proposal took shape in which one
hundred American missiles would be traded for all seven American hostages.
The trade would serve as a demonstration of good faith.
With mutual trust established, the two sides might then be
able to start talking about the bigger picture, the eventual
ouster of the Iyatola. As McFarland well knew, the deal
(25:43):
would violate American policy in at least two ways. First,
it would break the Reagan administration's rule against negotiating with terrorists. Second,
it would undermine the international effort to stop weapons sales
to Iran that the US it self had introduced principles Aside,
the arms for hostages deal would depend entirely on the
(26:04):
credibility of the mysterious Iranian fixer, Manucher Gorbanifar, a man
McFarlane didn't know at all.
Speaker 13 (26:11):
I thought it was fraud.
Speaker 17 (26:13):
After all, unless you have absolute conviction in the integrity
of the people you're dealing with, a barter for hostages
is just an open door to encouraging more hostages being taken.
Speaker 1 (26:30):
Nonetheless, McFarland decided the opportunity was worth bringing to President Reagan.
The risk was obvious, but so was the potential for
a historic world changing moment. Remember McFarland's role model was
Henry Kissinger, whose crowning achievement under Nixon was making a
surprise opening to communist China. Here again is Jane Mayer.
Speaker 10 (26:50):
He just so wanted to be a major global player.
He wanted to be like Henry Kissinger. He wanted to
be a huge state craft warrior who was going to
change the world. And this looked like something where he could,
you know, put his mark on the world and have
a legacy here.
Speaker 1 (27:17):
Two weeks after McFarland's meeting with David Kimkey, Ronald Reagan
was in the hospital recovering from surgery that removed a
cancerous growth from his intestine. McFarland came to Reagan's bedside
to brief him on the potential opening to Iran. McFarland
says he mapped out the benefits, but was very clear
on the downsides.
Speaker 17 (27:34):
They said, this is a very high risk venture for you.
I briefed him on the prospect that this could go wrong.
Speaker 1 (27:44):
McFarland told me that Reagan was enthusiastic about the idea
as soon as he understood that it might bring home
the hostages.
Speaker 17 (27:51):
He focused upon what Kimky had said that his intermediary,
Go Bonifar, believes that the army officers involved could affect
the release of the hostages. Well, Reagan said, well, but
we can't let an opportunity of that. Lord, it's risky
(28:11):
go buy. Let's test it first and see to what
extent there is good faith here or not.
Speaker 1 (28:20):
McFarland worked out a plan with Kimki and other Israeli
officials in order to avoid the appearance of a direct
weapons sale from the United States to Iran, the White
House would use Israel as a go between. Essentially, Israel
would sell some of their American made missiles to the
Iranian moderates, and the US would then replenish Israel's stocks.
(28:41):
Several top officials in the administration, notably the Secretary of
State and the Secretary of Defense, thought the arms for
hostages trade was a terrible idea. But as Jane Mayer
writes in Landslide, Reagan often blocked out uncomfortable information and
focused only on the positive, sometimes to the point of
self delusion. For example, after getting his cancer removed, Reagan
(29:04):
took the position that he had never had cancer in
the first place.
Speaker 10 (29:08):
As he saw it, whatever cancer had been in his
body had been taken out, and it was never he
who had had it. It was just the tumor that
had it, so he could say that, actually, he never
had cancer.
Speaker 1 (29:21):
Reagan was so focused on the hostages that he waved
away the arguments as cabinet officers tried to make against
the Iran plan.
Speaker 17 (29:28):
He just didn't want to deal with it. He was
an optimist. Oh, he was a near sighted humanitarian.
Speaker 13 (29:37):
If you will, but.
Speaker 17 (29:39):
Without thinking seriously about the downside risks here.
Speaker 1 (29:44):
According to McFarlane, Reagan called him in early August to
personally authorize the shipment of anti tank missiles to Iran.
Speaker 17 (29:53):
I reminded him again that look, this may not work,
and he said, well, Bud, we don't know until we try.
Speaker 1 (30:06):
By the summer of nineteen eighty five, the Weird family
felt like they were finallying traction with the Reagan administration.
According to John Weir, the breakthrough came after the family
scored a meeting with a prominent politician who had some
experience dealing with a hostage crisis, Jimmy Carter.
Speaker 16 (30:23):
We flew to the airport in Atlanta, and Jimmy Carter
met us in a lounge at the airport. There was
no one else present other than his security detail.
Speaker 1 (30:34):
The Weirs asked Carter for advice.
Speaker 16 (30:37):
And said, you know, we've been very frustrated with the
current administration. We don't feel like we're making any progress.
You know, what do you think? What can you tell us?
Speaker 1 (30:47):
Weir says that Carter initially hesitated, saying the family couldn't
possibly want his advice, but the Weirs kept pushing and
finally Carter gave them a name.
Speaker 16 (30:57):
Jimmy Carter said, you know, Bud McFarlane works in the
current administration and the National Security Council, and I will
contact Bud and ask him if he will meet with you.
And Jimmy Carter stepped out of the room and he
came back a few minutes later and he said, Bud
McFarlane has agreed to meet with you. Basically, that was
(31:18):
the end of the meeting.
Speaker 1 (31:21):
John Weir says that his family felt a sense of
momentum once they were introduced to Bud McFarlane. McFarland seemed engaged, sympathetic,
and solutions oriented. He also gave the family another contact
in the White House.
Speaker 16 (31:34):
This guy over here, Attenant, Colonel Oliver North, and he
will be your contact person. And if you have any
questions or any issues, Colonel North will make himself available
to you and you contact him and you talk to
him and he'll bring you up to speed on anything
that's going on.
Speaker 1 (31:51):
McFarlane had taken Oliver North under his wing at the
National Security Council. They were both graduates of the Naval
Academy who had served in Vietnam, and though they had
very different personalities, they were fond of each other. Accounts
differ on when exactly North was brought into the Iran initiative,
but starting in the sun of nineteen eighty five, he
(32:11):
began interfacing with hostage families like the Weirs.
Speaker 16 (32:15):
Colonel North would provide information from time to time about
trips he was taking. He wouldn't give any details, but
he would say, well, you know, I flew and inn
F fourteen to go to Europe for a quick meeting
that was really important. Would kind of talk about how
tough his life was, which is kind of funny. You know,
(32:39):
how hard he worked and all the hours he put in,
and how he had to take off on short notice
for things. And he would answer the phone when we
called and he would talk to us, which was a
big step forward.
Speaker 1 (32:52):
McFarlane and North met with several hostage families throughout the
summer and offered similar assurances.
Speaker 11 (32:57):
The families of the American hostages said that in an
hour with National Security Advisor Robert McFarlane they had learned
a lot more about what the Reagan administration has been
doing and they had.
Speaker 13 (33:07):
Known in the past.
Speaker 1 (33:09):
John Weir said that despite the overtures, his mother, Carol
was skeptical. After spending decades living in Lebanon, she had
deep reservations about US foreign policy in the Middle East.
Earlier that year, she had met with Secretary of State
George Schultz, but the Schultz's surprise and frustration, she used
the time to lay out the grievances of her husband's captors,
(33:30):
telling Schultz that US policy in the Middle East was
partially to blame for her husband's kidnapping. As Carol Weir
saw it, McFarlane and North were part of the same
American made machine.
Speaker 16 (33:41):
My mother did not trust Bud MacFarlane or Colonel North
or George Schultz at all. She didn't believe anything they
told her, and she didn't really trust the information that
they gave her.
Speaker 13 (33:54):
You know.
Speaker 16 (33:54):
She didn't want to be uncooperative or ungrateful, but she
didn't really believe that they were being productive or being honest.
Speaker 1 (34:06):
On August twentieth, nineteen eighty five, the first arms for
hostages trade between the US and Iran began. That evening,
ninety six anti tank missiles were loaded onto a plane
at Bengurian Airport in Tel Aviv. The operation was carried
out in complete secrecy. Only a handful of people knew
it was happening. According to Plan, the missiles were Israeli
(34:29):
owned and made in California. The cargo also included the
man responsible for putting the deal together, Manu Chair Gorbanifhar,
but after the shipment went through, no hostages were released. Instead,
Gorbanifar conveyed a new demand. He said the ninety six
missiles had been intercepted by hardliners in the Iranian Revolutionary
(34:51):
Guard Corps. His moderate contact in the Iranian government now
wanted four hundred more. Gorbanifar also said that the exchange
would only get one hostage released, not all seven, as
the Americans had been hoping. Bud McFarlane did not like
what he was hearing.
Speaker 17 (35:10):
The kind of things that are obviouscations that tell you
either they're not competent to do this or that there's
malfeasance and you're being screwed here. And I said, look,
this is really unimpressive on their part and foolish on ours.
If we can't get this straightened.
Speaker 1 (35:30):
Out, Reagan agreed to the terms of the new proposal.
A second Israeli shipment, this time carrying more than four
hundred missiles was sent to Iran. Meanwhile, MacFarland had received
a call from one of the many intermediaries he had
been dealing with and was told that he would have
to pick which hostage to release. As McFarland later described it,
(35:55):
he was being asked to play god. Despite the pressure,
MacFarland felt the choice was obvious. Administration officials have been
profoundly worried about William Buckley, a CIA officer. They were
worried about his health, of course, but they were also
really worried about the kidnappers getting classified information out of him.
So McFarland chose Buckley.
Speaker 17 (36:16):
And clearly that's the one I favored, just out of
professional anguish.
Speaker 1 (36:25):
But the kidnappers did not release The CIA station chief
Gorbanifar relayed that Buckley was too sick to be transferred.
This was a disturbing news. Either Buckley's condition was worsening
or the kidnappers thought they could get more weapons for
him later. Instead, the Americans were getting someone else. We'll
(36:52):
be right back. On September fifteenth, nearly five hundred days
after the Reverend Benjamin Weir was kidnapped, his family got
a call from the Reage administration.
Speaker 16 (37:06):
Somewhat unexpectedly, we were told that my dad had been released.
At that particular moment, we weren't really expecting that news.
We'd had no premonition that that was going to happen
in any way. But we're also told, you know, you
really need to keep this quiet. We don't want anybody
to know. We think other people may be released, and
(37:28):
any type of public disclosure of this information right now
could put the release of the other people at risk.
Speaker 1 (37:34):
The family traveled to a hotel in Virginia to gather
with officials from the federal government.
Speaker 16 (37:39):
And then all of a sudden, there was a knock
on the door and there was my dad. Quite a shock.
Speaker 1 (37:50):
Five days later, President Reagan announced that Weir had come home.
Speaker 12 (37:54):
I'm pleased to inform you if at Reverend Benjamin Weir
has now been released.
Speaker 1 (38:03):
Neither Weir, nor his family, nor anyone else outside of
Reagan's inner circle knew that Weir had been set free
as part of an arms for hostages deal, and so
the administration had to walk a very fine line between
celebrating Weir's release and keeping its distance. In the briefing room,
the official explanation was that foreign humanitarians had helped secure
Weir's freedom.
Speaker 5 (38:24):
I can assure you that no deal was made and
that our position on no concessions two terrorists has not changed.
Speaker 6 (38:31):
The President and other officials hinted strongly that US efforts
had obtained Reverend Ware's release, but they wrapped that claim
in a mystery of no comments. The impression left by
all of this is that things are afoot, that Reverend
Ware's release was no fluke, but the product of an
intense administration effort that could still result in the freeing
of the other six.
Speaker 1 (38:49):
As far as William Buckley was concerned, he would never
be released. He had died before the first weapons shipment
ever touched down in Tehran. In the weeks after a
Weir's release, the big question for the Reagan administration was
what to do next. Six hostages remained in Beirut and
(39:10):
Manuchaer Gorbanifharr was saying that the Iranians wanted more weapons.
All of that meant that an opening to Iran and
potentially a path to regime change were still on the table.
But McFarland was starting to have serious doubts about Gorbanifhar.
Did this guy actually know any moderates in Iran or
was he just saying whatever he needed to say in
(39:31):
order to earn his commission on the weapons sales.
Speaker 17 (39:33):
Well, the more I heard about Gorboni Fahar, the lower
my confidence that this had any plausibility.
Speaker 1 (39:40):
McFarland was right to be skeptical. As it turned out,
the August arms deal wasn't the first time Gorbanifar had
approached the US government to offer help in releasing the hostages.
Here's Jane Mayer again.
Speaker 10 (39:53):
He had already twice taken polygraphs at the CIA and
flunked them both in earlier episodes when he went to
the CIA and claimed that he knew who had kidnapped Buckley,
at which point the CIA labeled him a fabricator and
put out a burn notice, meaning don't deal with this guy.
Speaker 1 (40:16):
By the fall of nineteen eighty five, McFarland was exhausted
and he was ready to retire from government. In late November,
he told Reagan that he wanted to leave the administration.
He tried to resign once before, a year earlier, but
Reagan had convinced him to stay, telling him he considered
him indispensable. This time, Reagan accepted McFarland's decision. According to McFarlane,
(40:40):
he then told the President that the Iran initiative that
McFarland himself had introduced four and a half months earlier
was doomed to failure.
Speaker 17 (40:47):
I didn't think it was working. I think, at best,
if there are any pragmatists in Iran, we're not in
touch with them. And the stakes here in terms of
the failure of the mission, but more importantly, the embarrassment,
even if it had succeeded and were disclosed, was just
(41:09):
too great. And wanted to leave government and did not
want to leave a ticking bomb Bill.
Speaker 1 (41:18):
McFarlane was getting ready to leave the White House, Reagan
asked him to fly to London and discussed the arrangement
with Gorbonifhar in person. McFarlane was on a flight to
London that very night. Oliver North was already there, and
on Sunday, December eighth, the two of them met Gorbanifar
in a West End apartment belonging to an Israeli armsdeer.
(41:38):
The meeting did not go well.
Speaker 17 (41:41):
It started off mildly enough, but I explained that the
President had heard my recommendation that it be discontinued because
there was simply was amounting evidence of bad faith on
the Iranian side. I said, this is a pointless, open ended,
(42:01):
bad idea, and my country, my president is unwilling to
accept the risks, and I'm here to convey his decision
that this simply will not go on. It's terminated. Immediately.
Gorbani far flared stormed around, said, you're foolish, you're crazy,
(42:25):
you're misguided, You're wrong. This will mature, it will develop.
I'm telling you, I've dealt with these people for a
long time.
Speaker 13 (42:34):
And I said, I don't believe you, and we left.
Speaker 1 (42:42):
When McFarlane returned to Washington, he reported that Gorbanifharr was
a borderline moron and called him the most despicable character
he had ever met. But as he prepared to clear
out his office, McFarlane says he feared that, despite his
best efforts, the Arms for Hostages program was not truly dead.
(43:02):
The President was simply too invested in bringing the hostages home.
Speaker 17 (43:06):
I knew that his preoccupation was the safety of the
hostages would lead him to start this process up again,
and it was with doubt, in fact high prospect of
it being renewed that. I nonetheless tabled my resignation and left.
(43:30):
And I shouldn't have done it. I consider that I
had failed our country and retiring at that point. The
only person that could have stopped it was me, and
I didn't do it.
Speaker 1 (43:47):
Look, Farland knew that Reagan trusted him. If he had
stayed by the President's side, maybe he would have succeeded
at extinguishing the Iran initiative for good.
Speaker 17 (43:57):
The President came to office, I think to be a
domestic president, and he never made any pretense at being
a man of great depth on foreign affairs. And for
him to say at the end in tears, but I
never had anybody I could count on as indispensable.
Speaker 13 (44:16):
But you are that guy. Well I was, But.
Speaker 17 (44:25):
From my first time at the Naval Academy. I mean,
it's in your bones. You know what your job is,
serve the country, and don't blame somebody else. Don't make
up pretense, don't figure out some excuse circumstances. It's kind
of blarny. I mean, step up. Now, you can solve
(44:48):
your soul by saying, well, the President asked me to
do it. But if you know, as I knew that
this was not going to work. I don't think there's
any way of salvaging that's that's something that gets sorted
out when you die and it's all over. But you
can at least stand up, tell the truth, take responsibility
(45:14):
and move on, and judgments will be rendered by people
that aren't really qualifyed. Whatever good you did while you
were in government, nobody will remember that. The ending of
the Cold War, bringing down Marxism, Soviet Union, reducing nuclear
(45:37):
weapons for the first time industry, all these things happened,
and nobody knows that and they never will.
Speaker 13 (45:45):
And so.
Speaker 17 (45:47):
Sure, if I had to do again, I would not
have let it go on. But I did, and there's
no changing the facts.
Speaker 8 (46:01):
The changing of the guard today and a top White
House foreign policy job, national Security Advisor, Robert McFarland, resigned
and he was replaced by his deputy.
Speaker 6 (46:10):
Farland was a Kissinger proteget.
Speaker 11 (46:12):
He was appointed National Security Advisor as a quiet team player.
Speaker 1 (46:15):
After McFarland's departure from the White House, talks between Oliver
North and Minuchair Gribonifar did indeed resume, and two months
later more American missiles were on their way to Iran.
(46:41):
On the next episode of Fiasco, the Reagan Administration's War
on Communism arrives secretly in Nicaragua.
Speaker 19 (46:48):
I was confronted with questions which began more or less
as follows, mister ambassador, the CIA has blown up the
bridges connecting Nicaragua and Honduras. What do you think about this?
Start to your investorship.
Speaker 1 (47:07):
For a list of books, articles, and documentary we used
in our research, follow the link in the show notes.
Fiasco is a production of Prologue Projects and it's distributed
by Pushkin Industries. The show is produced by Andrew Parsons,
Madeline kaplan Ula Kulpa and me Leon Mayfock. Our editor
was Camilla Hammer. Our researcher was Francis Carr. Additional archival
(47:29):
research from Caitlin Nicholas. Our music is by Nick Silvester.
Our theme song is by Spatial Relations. Our artwork is
by Teddy Blanks at Chips and y Audio, mixed by
Rob Buyers, Michael Rayphiel and Johnny Vince Evans. Copyright council
provided by Peter Yassi at Yass Butler Plc. Thanks to
Chris weir aviad Ryan Bonnell, Malcolm Burne, Shane Harris, Michael Ledeen,
(47:55):
Howard Titcher, TC Winter, as well as Sam Graham, Felsen,
Saya Shockley, and Katchak and Kova. Special thanks to Luminary
and thank you for listening.
Pushkin. Hey Leon here, Before we get to this episode,
I want to let you know that you can binge
the entire season of Fiasco Iran Contra right now, add
free by becoming a Pushkin Plus subscriber. Sign up for
Pushkin Plus on the Fiasco Apple podcast show page, or
visit Pushkin dot Fm slash Plus. Now onto the show.
Speaker 2 (00:49):
Ronald Reagan makes his debut.
Speaker 3 (00:50):
Today is America's leading map.
Speaker 1 (00:57):
On the morning of January twentieth, nineteen eighty one, the
White House was preparing for the arrival of a new president,
but some unfinished business was threatening to overshadow the festivities.
Speaker 4 (01:07):
I Reagan may be the first president the day's top
news story on his inauguration day.
Speaker 3 (01:13):
There's Angxiat that hangs over everything.
Speaker 5 (01:15):
This whole business of the hostages.
Speaker 1 (01:19):
This whole business of the hostages referred to more than
fifty American citizens who were being held prisoner in Iran.
They had been there for more than a year, locked
inside the US Embassy in Tehran by a group of
young radicals.
Speaker 6 (01:32):
The US Embassy in Tehran has been invaded and occupied
by Iranian students.
Speaker 7 (01:36):
The American hostages were blindfolded, handcuffed, and marched out on
the US Embassy's front steps by the revolutionary students. The
Iranians had fought US Marine guards for three hours for
control of the embassy.
Speaker 1 (01:48):
The hostage crisis started in November of nineteen seventy nine.
Iran had just undergone a revolution a few months earlier.
The Shah, Iran's long serving US backed leader had been
overthrown and exiled. Islamic fundamentalists who called America the Great
Satan had taken power. American news networks reported that Iran's
new Supreme Leader, the Ayatola Rujuola Komeni, had given the
(02:11):
hostage takers his blessing.
Speaker 6 (02:13):
The move has the Iola's personal support, which adds to
Washington's difficulty in trying to resolve this dangerous situation.
Speaker 1 (02:21):
President Jimmy Carter tried to pressure Iran into releasing the hostages.
His administration cut diplomatic ties with the Komeni government, and
they froze Iranian state assets in US banks. Carter even
authorized the secret rescue mission, but it ended in disaster.
Speaker 2 (02:37):
Thousands of jubile and Iranians gathered outside to celebrate the
defeat and disgrace of America.
Speaker 8 (02:42):
The United States tried to free the hostages and failed.
Speaker 1 (02:45):
None of the hostages were released, and eight American servicemen
were killed in a helicopter crash. The failed mission made
Carter look hapless and ineffective, and the crisis continued. Americans
turned on their televisions for nightly updates. Walter Cronkite began
signing off at the end of every broadcast by noting
the number of days the Americans had been held captive.
Speaker 3 (03:06):
That's the word it is. Tuesday, February nineteenth, nineteen eighty
undred and eighth day of captivity, two hundred and twenty
second day of captivity, three hundred and seventy seventh day
of captivity for American hostages.
Speaker 1 (03:17):
Inter rat Carter's efforts to win the hostages release stretched
into his re election campaign.
Speaker 9 (03:22):
The Republicans are itching to turn the hostage crisis against
the administration.
Speaker 2 (03:27):
The administration has boxed it so bad that we're left
with very few options.
Speaker 10 (03:30):
The hostage issue hovered over the whole campaign, and it
was something that just so damaged Carter.
Speaker 1 (03:38):
That's journalist Jane Mayer, who covered the Reagan administration for
The Wall Street Journal and co authored the book Landslide.
Speaker 10 (03:45):
And the idea of Carter being weak was really the
thing that was hammered over and over again and played
a big part in why he lost.
Speaker 1 (03:58):
Reagan's inauguration in nineteen eighty one marked the four hundred
and forty fourth day of the hostage crisis. The outgoing
Carter administration had hoped it would be the last.
Speaker 5 (04:07):
This has been quite a suspense evening.
Speaker 10 (04:10):
Jimmy Carter, his last night in the White House, spent
it in the Oval Office working with his aids.
Speaker 1 (04:16):
The day before, they had notified the press that a
deal had been reached to finally free the Americans, but
the hostages were still not home.
Speaker 10 (04:25):
In the United States to be Carter.
Speaker 1 (04:28):
At the inauguration ceremony, Carter walked to the dais where
Reagan was about to be sworn in. Even then, reporters
were yelling out to him for confirmation that the hostages
were being released.
Speaker 11 (04:39):
Whether you could hear or not.
Speaker 12 (04:40):
The President at Carter, which just passed if the hostagers
are out, and he responded saying not yet, not yet.
Speaker 1 (04:50):
The Iranians were not going to release the hostages on
Carter's watch. They waited until after Reagan was sworn in.
Before allowing them to leave Tehran. As Carter traveled home
to Georgia, Reagan got to announce the good news.
Speaker 13 (05:04):
Some thirty minutes ago.
Speaker 12 (05:07):
The planes bearing our prison left Iranian airspace and are
now breathed.
Speaker 2 (05:16):
But it had been a wrenching day for mister Carter,
and aide said he had been terribly hurt and disappointed
when he was not able to announce the release of
the hostages before leaving alf Us this morning.
Speaker 10 (05:28):
The simultaneous inauguration of Reagan and the hostages getting out
enabled him to take full credit for it and sort
of appear to be the savior.
Speaker 1 (05:38):
A week later, Reagan welcomed the hostages home in a
ceremony in the Rose.
Speaker 5 (05:42):
Gardens at the White House, a welcome fit for a king,
a kind of South Lawn ceremony usually reserved for visiting.
Speaker 13 (05:48):
Heads of states.
Speaker 12 (05:52):
Welcome home, you are home, and believe me, you are welcome.
Speaker 1 (05:59):
But the triumphant moment also created a liability for the
Reagan administration.
Speaker 10 (06:03):
It so publicly associated them with this act that it
upped the anti for Reagan. He was more vulnerable than
maybe other presidents would have been to being manipulated on
the issue because he'd made this sort of his selling point.
Speaker 1 (06:18):
Later, one of Reagan's counter terrorism analysts expressed regret over
the spectacle. Where did we first go wrong? Nineteen eighty one?
He said, once we had the Rose Garden ceremony, we
had attached huge political benefits to the return of US hostages.
In other words, Reagan had set himself up for a
potential hostage crisis of his own. I'm Leon Nevak from
(06:42):
Prolog Projects and Pushkin Industries. This is fiasco iran contrast.
Speaker 14 (06:47):
Seven Americans kidnapped over the past fifteen months, seven Americans
who have disappeared.
Speaker 15 (06:53):
The Reagan administration's response to the series of kidnappings has
been one of almost total silence.
Speaker 16 (06:57):
They did not want to have a hostage problem like
Jimmy Carter has.
Speaker 10 (07:01):
Maybe they can get the hostages out.
Speaker 1 (07:03):
I can't assure you that no deal was made.
Speaker 6 (07:05):
The impression left by all of this is that things
are afoot.
Speaker 17 (07:07):
The only person that could have stopped me, and I
didn't do it.
Speaker 1 (07:16):
Episode two, Trade Secrets how Ronald Reagan tried to avoid
Jimmy Carter's fate by extending a hand to one of
America's sworn enemies. We'll be right back. Among the advisors
(07:38):
and aides who joined Ronald Reagan in the White House
was a soft spoken and cerebral retired Marine named Robert
Bud McFarlane. McFarlane's domain was foreign policy. As a student
at the US Naval Academy, he had longed to have
a hand in shaping America's relationship to the rest of
the world.
Speaker 17 (07:56):
And I had to think with all the rigor I
could muster about the elements of power and their nature
and their limits.
Speaker 1 (08:06):
This is Bud McFarlane speaking to me in December of
twe nineteen in Washington, DC.
Speaker 13 (08:12):
All that is not unique to me.
Speaker 17 (08:14):
I mean, hundreds thousands of people go through as good
or better schools than I did and get this foundation
knowledge and self confidence that, yes, you can contribute constructively
because you know the rules and you occasionally have a
lucid interval and even imagination that could make the world
(08:37):
a better place.
Speaker 1 (08:38):
Bud McFarland died in twenty twenty two at the age
of eighty four. Perhaps more than anyone else in the
Reagan White House, McFarlane felt personally responsible for the events
that led to Iran Contra. When I first approached him
about an interview. He made it clear that rehashing the
story of the scandal would be painful.
Speaker 17 (08:58):
Remorse doesn't quite capture it. I I'd failed my country.
Speaker 1 (09:07):
McFarlane's career in government began during that Nickson administration, when
he worked for Henry Kissinger.
Speaker 4 (09:13):
Henry Kissinger has been on the road conferring, negotiating, and
meeting with heads of state in eight countries in nine days.
Speaker 1 (09:19):
McFarlane saw Kissinger as a professional role model, an ambitious
geopolitical thinker who could see the vulnerabilities of America's adversaries
and knew how to exploit them.
Speaker 4 (09:29):
Kissinger carried out his Middle East peace mission today in
three Arab countries.
Speaker 2 (09:33):
He's the most gifted man to work in American foreign
policy in any generation since World War Two.
Speaker 17 (09:40):
Henry was someone who I had admired, notwithstanding his cynicism
and occasionally ruthless methods, and being there even as a
note taker was a.
Speaker 13 (09:56):
Gift.
Speaker 1 (09:58):
In nineteen eighty three, just days before the invasion of Grenada,
Reagan made McFarlane his National Security Advisor, the same job
Henry Kissinger had held a decade earlier.
Speaker 12 (10:09):
Robert McFarlane, we'll be confirmed as National Security Advisor, but
I want to thank you for accepting this new challenge.
All of us look forward to working with you in
the coming months.
Speaker 1 (10:23):
From the beginning of his tenure as National Security Advisor,
McFarlan had a special interest in Iran. He believed that
even though Iran was led by the intensely anti American
Iatola Komani, the US might have a chance to intervene
in the country's politics.
Speaker 9 (10:38):
Conscious of iran strategic and economic importance, the administration wants
to keep the door open to possible reconciliation. But while
Comte lives, that seems a distant hope.
Speaker 17 (10:48):
I really didn't imagine that we had a plausible prospect
of being able to engage with this government. I did think, however,
that there were reasons why the circumstances facing Iran might
give us an opportunity to influence the regime change.
Speaker 1 (11:12):
McFarlane had this theory that there might be people inside
the Iranian military who would be amenable to the idea
of a coup against Komani. Theoretically, the Americans could help
these dissident elements and in the process turn Iran from
an enemy into an ally. The way they had been
before the revolution.
Speaker 17 (11:31):
I mean, you'd have to have the very senior leadership
of the military who had become demoralized. And that's theory,
but it was a very plausible possibility that the military
would be the instrument of changing the regime in a
relatively bloodless coup.
Speaker 1 (11:51):
MacFarlane had a specific reason for thinking that Iran was
vulnerable to an internal coup. As he saw it, the
country was stuck between two foreign powers, Iraq to the
west and the Soviet Union to the northeast. In Iraq,
the problem was Saddam Hussein, who had invaded Iran in
nineteen eighty right after the Iranian Revolution. The war that
(12:12):
followed was unimaginably violent. Hundreds of thousands of people were
being killed.
Speaker 14 (12:17):
A war that started months ago with fretful skirm issues,
a war that no one now seems able to stop.
Speaker 1 (12:26):
Meanwhile, the Soviet Union was just sort of looming over Iran.
Speaker 13 (12:30):
On its northern border.
Speaker 9 (12:31):
Iran worries about twenty four Soviet divisions.
Speaker 1 (12:34):
The two countries shared a border, and MacFarland had no
doubt that the Soviets, who had recently invaded Afghanistan, wanted
to gain influence in the Middle East. He thought maybe
there were people within the Iranian leadership who were concerned
about the same thing.
Speaker 17 (12:48):
Out of self interest. That ought to have nurtured a
dissonant element.
Speaker 1 (12:58):
There was just one problem. McFarlane didn't actually know for
sure that these dissidents existed. He was thinking strategically, just
like Kissinger had taught him, and he was hoping to
be fair. There wasn't much else he could do. Concrete
intelligence about what was happening in the Iranian government was
very hard to come by. The relationship between Iran and
(13:20):
the US was openly hostile.
Speaker 8 (13:22):
Leading officials of the Reagan administration repeatedly have accused Iran
of sponsoring terrorist attacks against the United States.
Speaker 1 (13:30):
In nineteen eighty four, the Reagan administration officially designated the
Komani regime a state sponsor of terrorism. They enforced an
arms embargo that prevented the US government from selling weapons
to Iran, and launched a diplomatic campaign to pressure other
countries to do the same.
Speaker 9 (13:45):
The burning of the American flag, the shouts of Death
to America.
Speaker 1 (13:50):
Friday prayers, Iranian imams led chance of death to America.
So it was Chile between the Reagan White House and
the Komani regime. But then in July of nineteen eighty five,
Bud McFarlane received a visit from a trusted associate bearing
good news. It turned out that the people mc farland
(14:10):
had been imagining the dissidents within the Iranian regime were
in fact real and they wanted to talk. Around the
same time, a related crisis was unfolding in the Middle East.
Speaker 5 (14:27):
The American University of Beirut today is under heavier guard
than usual. The US Embassy there, citing intelligence reports, has
warned that pro Iranian extremists are planning mass kidnappings of
Americans on the campus.
Speaker 1 (14:39):
John Weir was in his twenties when his father was
taken hostage in Lebanon.
Speaker 16 (14:43):
I remember talking to my sisters and my sisters being upset,
my mom being very upset.
Speaker 1 (14:49):
It was six months into Bud McFarland's tenure as National
Security Advisor, and about three years since the American hostages
taken in Tehran were returned home. John Weir's father, the
Reverend Benjamin Weir, was a Presbyterian minister who had been
assigned to Beirut, the capital city of Lebanon. Weir was
kidnapped as he and his wife Carol were leaving them apartment.
Speaker 16 (15:11):
And not too far from the anxious department building, a
car pulled up, some guys got out and grabbed my dad.
My mom tried to fight them off, She's not much
of a fighter, and they basically just muzzled him into
the car and drove off.
Speaker 1 (15:28):
In the nineteen eighties, Lebanon was embroiled in a brutal
sectarian civil war, and Islamic militia groups began kidnapping European
and American citizens. The group that captured Benjamin Weir was
associated with Hesbela, which enjoyed the support of the Komani
regime in Iran. By nineteen eighty five, Weir was one
of seven Americans being held hostage in Lebanon.
Speaker 14 (15:50):
Seven Americans kidnapped in Beirut over the past fifteen months,
seven Americans who have disappeared.
Speaker 1 (15:56):
In addition to Weir, the group of hostages included a
Catholic priest, a correspondent for the Associated Press, and three
employees of the American University in Beirut. In the federal government,
administration officials were most co earned, with one hostage in particular,
a CIA operative named William Buckley.
Speaker 5 (16:15):
William Buckley, a political officer at the US Embassy in Beirut,
was kidnapped.
Speaker 4 (16:19):
He was kidnapped on March the sixteenth, nineteen eighty four.
Speaker 1 (16:23):
Buckley had been with the CIA for decades, working in Zayir, Cambodia, Egypt,
and Pakistan. When he was kidnapped, Buckley was the head
of the CIA's be Route Division, though that was not
public information at the time. News outlets identified him only
as a political officer at the US Embassy. In January
of nineteen eighty five, Buckley's captors released a videotape of
(16:45):
him to prove that he was still alive.
Speaker 15 (16:49):
January nineteen, page five Hi as well.
Speaker 1 (16:55):
In the video, Buckley appeared weak and his voice sounded thin.
Intelligence officials feared that the kidnappers were torturing him in
order to get CIA's secrets. As Buckley's captivity stretched into
its second year, it weighed on the minds of administration
officials like McFarlane, CIA Director William Casey and President Reagan himself,
(17:16):
But the administration seemed to be avoiding drawing attention to
the hostage situation as much as possible.
Speaker 15 (17:21):
The Reagan administration's response to the series of kidnappings has
been one of almost total silence. What a complete contrast
to the actions of the Carter administration when Iranian extremists
seized the American embassy in Tehran more than five years ago.
Speaker 1 (17:35):
Here again is John Weir.
Speaker 16 (17:37):
The Reagan White House had made a lot of political
hay out of Jimmy Carter's issues with the hostages in Iran,
and it was pretty clear to us that they were
kind of suppressing as much as they could discussion of
hostages or use of the word hostages, and they did
(17:58):
not want to have a hostage problem like Jimmy Carter had.
Speaker 1 (18:01):
The administration had also publicly committed itself to an ironclad
principle America does not negotiate with terrorists.
Speaker 12 (18:09):
Terrorists and those who support them must and will be
held to account.
Speaker 10 (18:15):
The principle was that, you know, we should never deal
with terrorists.
Speaker 1 (18:19):
Here's Jane Mayer again, that you.
Speaker 10 (18:21):
Do not honor them by dealing with them, and they
took a very hard line on it.
Speaker 1 (18:27):
The Reagan administration communicated a consistent message to the Weir family,
just laylo, the government is doing everything it can. They
even had a phrase for it, quiet diplomacy.
Speaker 16 (18:38):
Quiet diplomacy was their explanation of why we had no
idea what they were doing. We would say, so, what
are you doing, Oh, well, we're using quiet diplomacy.
Speaker 1 (18:50):
Eventually, Benjamin Weir's wife, Carol took matters into her own hands.
She had lived in Lebanon for more than thirty years
and she knew a lot of people. She began traveling
around the region talking to religious leaders, following leads of
her own, and comparing notes with her contacts at the
US embassy.
Speaker 16 (19:07):
She would ask them, you know, who have you seen?
And there were a couple of occasions when they mentioned
some people and she said, well, I've already seen that person. So,
you know, she started trying to figure out who had them,
what was going on, what did they want. But after
we'd heard quiet diplomacy long enough, we decided that the
(19:28):
quiet diplomacy was just a way of trying to pacify us,
and that we needed to ratchet things up.
Speaker 1 (19:36):
Finally, Carol Weir decided that she needed to relocate to
the United States and take her message to Washington.
Speaker 4 (19:44):
The wife of the Reverend Benjamin Weir was in Washington
today seeking more help for her husband.
Speaker 18 (19:49):
It's four hundred and seventeen days now for me since
my husband was kidnapped. As that's a long time, and
I believe they have been forgotten.
Speaker 1 (20:00):
The Weirs used the resources of the Presbyterian Church to
launch a public pressure campaign. They spoke at churches and
gave press conferences. They organized an effort to get a
milli letters written to the administration. In one speech, Carol
Weir invoked the Iranian hostage crisis that had consumed the
nation's attention just a few years earlier. She asked if
(20:20):
she would have to wait four hundred and forty four
days to see her husband. During his first term, Reagan's
closest aids had tried to prevent the president from directly
engaging with the hostage families.
Speaker 10 (20:35):
The old aides who knew him well, tried to keep
people with hard luck stories away from him. That is
the truth about Reagan was that whenever there was somebody
who was an individual with a problem that was near him,
he had a tendency to be empathetic and he could
be manipulated.
Speaker 1 (20:52):
Reagan's minders had feared that if he met with the
hostage families, he would begin pushing to get their loved
ones released at any cost, and he might be tempted
to violate his policy of never negotiating with terrorists. But
by the summer of nineteen eighty five, many of Reagan's
first term aids were no longer around. Without them there
to hold him back, the President began to fixate on
(21:14):
the hostages, asking about them in meetings nearly every day
and agonizing over their continued captivity.
Speaker 10 (21:20):
He basically got drawn in and hooked and became emotionally
involved in the situation, and he made clear that he
cared and he really wanted these hostages out and something
done about it. And his motto, which he often said
to his aides, was don't bring me problems, bring me solutions.
Speaker 1 (21:40):
In July of nineteen eighty five, National security advisor Bud
McFarlane approached the President with a possible solution. In his diary,
Reagan wrote, some strange soundings are coming from the Iranians.
Bud em will be here tomorrow to talk about it.
It could be a breakthrough on getting our seven kidnap
victims back. McFarland's meeting with Reagan was prompted by a
(22:02):
conversation he had had two weeks earlier with a senior
Israeli diplomat. The diplomat's name was David kim k He
had previously served as deputy director of Masad, Israel's intelligence agency,
and MacFarland trusted his judgment. According to MacFarlane, kim Key
told him that Israel had been in touch with Iranians
(22:23):
who were disaffected by the turmoil in their country and
who were both willing and able to change the government.
Speaker 17 (22:30):
It was simply stated that there are elements in the
Iranian army that are prepared to open a dialogue with
us that might lead to oh regime change, but that
it would take probably years of nurture to do it.
(22:51):
I was simply heartened, however, by the fact that he
thought it might be nurtured and developed over time.
Speaker 1 (22:59):
It was exactly what MacFarlane had hoped for, Iranian moderates
and positions of power who secretly opposed the revolutionary government
that had taken over their country. There was a catch.
The coup was not going to nurture itself before there
could be any dialogue between the US and these Iranian moderates.
(23:20):
The Americans would have to do Their new friends a
good turn, they would have to sell them some weapons. Specifically,
the Iranians wanted anti tank missiles for use in their
war against Iraq. It was a big request, but the
Iranians were offering something valuable in return. They could use
their influence over HESBLA to bring about the release of
(23:42):
William Buckley, Benjamin Weir, and all the other American hostages
being held in Lebanon. At least that's what Bud McFarlane
was hearing from David Kimke, the Israeli diplomat.
Speaker 17 (23:54):
Kim k presented it as their being able to achieve
the release of the hostages, and that wasn't just his notion,
but that it had been vetted by Iranians that he
believed were worthy people.
Speaker 1 (24:13):
How did David Kimki know they were worthy people? The
answer lay with the man who was helping Israel make
contact with the Iranian moderates. His name was Menu chair
Goorbanifar Orbanifar was an Iranian businessman living in Europe. He
was a kind of international fixer, a guy who helped
(24:34):
broker deals between parties who would otherwise have no reason
to trust each other. And according to David kimk Gorbanifar
could connect the Americans to the moderates inside Iran who
were open, perhaps even eager, for a better relationship with
the United States. If this all sounds convoluted, that's because
it was McFarlane, kimky goor Bonifar, these nameless moderates in Iran.
(24:58):
It's a bizarre daisy chain, and the mechanics of it
aren't that important. The point is a guy knew a
guy who knew a guy who claimed to know some
high level Iranians who didn't see eye to eye with
the anti American and Comani regime. Incredibly, that was enough
to get the ball rolling. Over the course of several weeks.
(25:20):
In July, a specific proposal took shape in which one
hundred American missiles would be traded for all seven American hostages.
The trade would serve as a demonstration of good faith.
With mutual trust established, the two sides might then be
able to start talking about the bigger picture, the eventual
ouster of the Iyatola. As McFarland well knew, the deal
(25:43):
would violate American policy in at least two ways. First,
it would break the Reagan administration's rule against negotiating with terrorists. Second,
it would undermine the international effort to stop weapons sales
to Iran that the US it self had introduced principles Aside,
the arms for hostages deal would depend entirely on the
(26:04):
credibility of the mysterious Iranian fixer, Manucher Gorbanifar, a man
McFarlane didn't know at all.
Speaker 13 (26:11):
I thought it was fraud.
Speaker 17 (26:13):
After all, unless you have absolute conviction in the integrity
of the people you're dealing with, a barter for hostages
is just an open door to encouraging more hostages being taken.
Speaker 1 (26:30):
Nonetheless, McFarland decided the opportunity was worth bringing to President Reagan.
The risk was obvious, but so was the potential for
a historic world changing moment. Remember McFarland's role model was
Henry Kissinger, whose crowning achievement under Nixon was making a
surprise opening to communist China. Here again is Jane Mayer.
Speaker 10 (26:50):
He just so wanted to be a major global player.
He wanted to be like Henry Kissinger. He wanted to
be a huge state craft warrior who was going to
change the world. And this looked like something where he could,
you know, put his mark on the world and have
a legacy here.
Speaker 1 (27:17):
Two weeks after McFarland's meeting with David Kimkey, Ronald Reagan
was in the hospital recovering from surgery that removed a
cancerous growth from his intestine. McFarland came to Reagan's bedside
to brief him on the potential opening to Iran. McFarland
says he mapped out the benefits, but was very clear
on the downsides.
Speaker 17 (27:34):
They said, this is a very high risk venture for you.
I briefed him on the prospect that this could go wrong.
Speaker 1 (27:44):
McFarland told me that Reagan was enthusiastic about the idea
as soon as he understood that it might bring home
the hostages.
Speaker 17 (27:51):
He focused upon what Kimky had said that his intermediary,
Go Bonifar, believes that the army officers involved could affect
the release of the hostages. Well, Reagan said, well, but
we can't let an opportunity of that. Lord, it's risky
(28:11):
go buy. Let's test it first and see to what
extent there is good faith here or not.
Speaker 1 (28:20):
McFarland worked out a plan with Kimki and other Israeli
officials in order to avoid the appearance of a direct
weapons sale from the United States to Iran, the White
House would use Israel as a go between. Essentially, Israel
would sell some of their American made missiles to the
Iranian moderates, and the US would then replenish Israel's stocks.
(28:41):
Several top officials in the administration, notably the Secretary of
State and the Secretary of Defense, thought the arms for
hostages trade was a terrible idea. But as Jane Mayer
writes in Landslide, Reagan often blocked out uncomfortable information and
focused only on the positive, sometimes to the point of
self delusion. For example, after getting his cancer removed, Reagan
(29:04):
took the position that he had never had cancer in
the first place.
Speaker 10 (29:08):
As he saw it, whatever cancer had been in his
body had been taken out, and it was never he
who had had it. It was just the tumor that
had it, so he could say that, actually, he never
had cancer.
Speaker 1 (29:21):
Reagan was so focused on the hostages that he waved
away the arguments as cabinet officers tried to make against
the Iran plan.
Speaker 17 (29:28):
He just didn't want to deal with it. He was
an optimist. Oh, he was a near sighted humanitarian.
Speaker 13 (29:37):
If you will, but.
Speaker 17 (29:39):
Without thinking seriously about the downside risks here.
Speaker 1 (29:44):
According to McFarlane, Reagan called him in early August to
personally authorize the shipment of anti tank missiles to Iran.
Speaker 17 (29:53):
I reminded him again that look, this may not work,
and he said, well, Bud, we don't know until we try.
Speaker 1 (30:06):
By the summer of nineteen eighty five, the Weird family
felt like they were finallying traction with the Reagan administration.
According to John Weir, the breakthrough came after the family
scored a meeting with a prominent politician who had some
experience dealing with a hostage crisis, Jimmy Carter.
Speaker 16 (30:23):
We flew to the airport in Atlanta, and Jimmy Carter
met us in a lounge at the airport. There was
no one else present other than his security detail.
Speaker 1 (30:34):
The Weirs asked Carter for advice.
Speaker 16 (30:37):
And said, you know, we've been very frustrated with the
current administration. We don't feel like we're making any progress.
You know, what do you think? What can you tell us?
Speaker 1 (30:47):
Weir says that Carter initially hesitated, saying the family couldn't
possibly want his advice, but the Weirs kept pushing and
finally Carter gave them a name.
Speaker 16 (30:57):
Jimmy Carter said, you know, Bud McFarlane works in the
current administration and the National Security Council, and I will
contact Bud and ask him if he will meet with you.
And Jimmy Carter stepped out of the room and he
came back a few minutes later and he said, Bud
McFarlane has agreed to meet with you. Basically, that was
(31:18):
the end of the meeting.
Speaker 1 (31:21):
John Weir says that his family felt a sense of
momentum once they were introduced to Bud McFarlane. McFarland seemed engaged, sympathetic,
and solutions oriented. He also gave the family another contact
in the White House.
Speaker 16 (31:34):
This guy over here, Attenant, Colonel Oliver North, and he
will be your contact person. And if you have any
questions or any issues, Colonel North will make himself available
to you and you contact him and you talk to
him and he'll bring you up to speed on anything
that's going on.
Speaker 1 (31:51):
McFarlane had taken Oliver North under his wing at the
National Security Council. They were both graduates of the Naval
Academy who had served in Vietnam, and though they had
very different personalities, they were fond of each other. Accounts
differ on when exactly North was brought into the Iran initiative,
but starting in the sun of nineteen eighty five, he
(32:11):
began interfacing with hostage families like the Weirs.
Speaker 16 (32:15):
Colonel North would provide information from time to time about
trips he was taking. He wouldn't give any details, but
he would say, well, you know, I flew and inn
F fourteen to go to Europe for a quick meeting
that was really important. Would kind of talk about how
tough his life was, which is kind of funny. You know,
(32:39):
how hard he worked and all the hours he put in,
and how he had to take off on short notice
for things. And he would answer the phone when we
called and he would talk to us, which was a
big step forward.
Speaker 1 (32:52):
McFarlane and North met with several hostage families throughout the
summer and offered similar assurances.
Speaker 11 (32:57):
The families of the American hostages said that in an
hour with National Security Advisor Robert McFarlane they had learned
a lot more about what the Reagan administration has been
doing and they had.
Speaker 13 (33:07):
Known in the past.
Speaker 1 (33:09):
John Weir said that despite the overtures, his mother, Carol
was skeptical. After spending decades living in Lebanon, she had
deep reservations about US foreign policy in the Middle East.
Earlier that year, she had met with Secretary of State
George Schultz, but the Schultz's surprise and frustration, she used
the time to lay out the grievances of her husband's captors,
(33:30):
telling Schultz that US policy in the Middle East was
partially to blame for her husband's kidnapping. As Carol Weir
saw it, McFarlane and North were part of the same
American made machine.
Speaker 16 (33:41):
My mother did not trust Bud MacFarlane or Colonel North
or George Schultz at all. She didn't believe anything they
told her, and she didn't really trust the information that
they gave her.
Speaker 13 (33:54):
You know.
Speaker 16 (33:54):
She didn't want to be uncooperative or ungrateful, but she
didn't really believe that they were being productive or being honest.
Speaker 1 (34:06):
On August twentieth, nineteen eighty five, the first arms for
hostages trade between the US and Iran began. That evening,
ninety six anti tank missiles were loaded onto a plane
at Bengurian Airport in Tel Aviv. The operation was carried
out in complete secrecy. Only a handful of people knew
it was happening. According to Plan, the missiles were Israeli
(34:29):
owned and made in California. The cargo also included the
man responsible for putting the deal together, Manu Chair Gorbanifhar,
but after the shipment went through, no hostages were released. Instead,
Gorbanifar conveyed a new demand. He said the ninety six
missiles had been intercepted by hardliners in the Iranian Revolutionary
(34:51):
Guard Corps. His moderate contact in the Iranian government now
wanted four hundred more. Gorbanifar also said that the exchange
would only get one hostage released, not all seven, as
the Americans had been hoping. Bud McFarlane did not like
what he was hearing.
Speaker 17 (35:10):
The kind of things that are obviouscations that tell you
either they're not competent to do this or that there's
malfeasance and you're being screwed here. And I said, look,
this is really unimpressive on their part and foolish on ours.
If we can't get this straightened.
Speaker 1 (35:30):
Out, Reagan agreed to the terms of the new proposal.
A second Israeli shipment, this time carrying more than four
hundred missiles was sent to Iran. Meanwhile, MacFarland had received
a call from one of the many intermediaries he had
been dealing with and was told that he would have
to pick which hostage to release. As McFarland later described it,
(35:55):
he was being asked to play god. Despite the pressure,
MacFarland felt the choice was obvious. Administration officials have been
profoundly worried about William Buckley, a CIA officer. They were
worried about his health, of course, but they were also
really worried about the kidnappers getting classified information out of him.
So McFarland chose Buckley.
Speaker 17 (36:16):
And clearly that's the one I favored, just out of
professional anguish.
Speaker 1 (36:25):
But the kidnappers did not release The CIA station chief
Gorbanifar relayed that Buckley was too sick to be transferred.
This was a disturbing news. Either Buckley's condition was worsening
or the kidnappers thought they could get more weapons for
him later. Instead, the Americans were getting someone else. We'll
(36:52):
be right back. On September fifteenth, nearly five hundred days
after the Reverend Benjamin Weir was kidnapped, his family got
a call from the Reage administration.
Speaker 16 (37:06):
Somewhat unexpectedly, we were told that my dad had been released.
At that particular moment, we weren't really expecting that news.
We'd had no premonition that that was going to happen
in any way. But we're also told, you know, you
really need to keep this quiet. We don't want anybody
to know. We think other people may be released, and
(37:28):
any type of public disclosure of this information right now
could put the release of the other people at risk.
Speaker 1 (37:34):
The family traveled to a hotel in Virginia to gather
with officials from the federal government.
Speaker 16 (37:39):
And then all of a sudden, there was a knock
on the door and there was my dad. Quite a shock.
Speaker 1 (37:50):
Five days later, President Reagan announced that Weir had come home.
Speaker 12 (37:54):
I'm pleased to inform you if at Reverend Benjamin Weir
has now been released.
Speaker 1 (38:03):
Neither Weir, nor his family, nor anyone else outside of
Reagan's inner circle knew that Weir had been set free
as part of an arms for hostages deal, and so
the administration had to walk a very fine line between
celebrating Weir's release and keeping its distance. In the briefing room,
the official explanation was that foreign humanitarians had helped secure
Weir's freedom.
Speaker 5 (38:24):
I can assure you that no deal was made and
that our position on no concessions two terrorists has not changed.
Speaker 6 (38:31):
The President and other officials hinted strongly that US efforts
had obtained Reverend Ware's release, but they wrapped that claim
in a mystery of no comments. The impression left by
all of this is that things are afoot, that Reverend
Ware's release was no fluke, but the product of an
intense administration effort that could still result in the freeing
of the other six.
Speaker 1 (38:49):
As far as William Buckley was concerned, he would never
be released. He had died before the first weapons shipment
ever touched down in Tehran. In the weeks after a
Weir's release, the big question for the Reagan administration was
what to do next. Six hostages remained in Beirut and
(39:10):
Manuchaer Gorbanifharr was saying that the Iranians wanted more weapons.
All of that meant that an opening to Iran and
potentially a path to regime change were still on the table.
But McFarland was starting to have serious doubts about Gorbanifhar.
Did this guy actually know any moderates in Iran or
was he just saying whatever he needed to say in
(39:31):
order to earn his commission on the weapons sales.
Speaker 17 (39:33):
Well, the more I heard about Gorboni Fahar, the lower
my confidence that this had any plausibility.
Speaker 1 (39:40):
McFarland was right to be skeptical. As it turned out,
the August arms deal wasn't the first time Gorbanifar had
approached the US government to offer help in releasing the hostages.
Here's Jane Mayer again.
Speaker 10 (39:53):
He had already twice taken polygraphs at the CIA and
flunked them both in earlier episodes when he went to
the CIA and claimed that he knew who had kidnapped Buckley,
at which point the CIA labeled him a fabricator and
put out a burn notice, meaning don't deal with this guy.
Speaker 1 (40:16):
By the fall of nineteen eighty five, McFarland was exhausted
and he was ready to retire from government. In late November,
he told Reagan that he wanted to leave the administration.
He tried to resign once before, a year earlier, but
Reagan had convinced him to stay, telling him he considered
him indispensable. This time, Reagan accepted McFarland's decision. According to McFarlane,
(40:40):
he then told the President that the Iran initiative that
McFarland himself had introduced four and a half months earlier
was doomed to failure.
Speaker 17 (40:47):
I didn't think it was working. I think, at best,
if there are any pragmatists in Iran, we're not in
touch with them. And the stakes here in terms of
the failure of the mission, but more importantly, the embarrassment,
even if it had succeeded and were disclosed, was just
(41:09):
too great. And wanted to leave government and did not
want to leave a ticking bomb Bill.
Speaker 1 (41:18):
McFarlane was getting ready to leave the White House, Reagan
asked him to fly to London and discussed the arrangement
with Gorbonifhar in person. McFarlane was on a flight to
London that very night. Oliver North was already there, and
on Sunday, December eighth, the two of them met Gorbanifar
in a West End apartment belonging to an Israeli armsdeer.
(41:38):
The meeting did not go well.
Speaker 17 (41:41):
It started off mildly enough, but I explained that the
President had heard my recommendation that it be discontinued because
there was simply was amounting evidence of bad faith on
the Iranian side. I said, this is a pointless, open ended,
(42:01):
bad idea, and my country, my president is unwilling to
accept the risks, and I'm here to convey his decision
that this simply will not go on. It's terminated. Immediately.
Gorbani far flared stormed around, said, you're foolish, you're crazy,
(42:25):
you're misguided, You're wrong. This will mature, it will develop.
I'm telling you, I've dealt with these people for a
long time.
Speaker 13 (42:34):
And I said, I don't believe you, and we left.
Speaker 1 (42:42):
When McFarlane returned to Washington, he reported that Gorbanifharr was
a borderline moron and called him the most despicable character
he had ever met. But as he prepared to clear
out his office, McFarlane says he feared that, despite his
best efforts, the Arms for Hostages program was not truly dead.
(43:02):
The President was simply too invested in bringing the hostages home.
Speaker 17 (43:06):
I knew that his preoccupation was the safety of the
hostages would lead him to start this process up again,
and it was with doubt, in fact high prospect of
it being renewed that. I nonetheless tabled my resignation and left.
(43:30):
And I shouldn't have done it. I consider that I
had failed our country and retiring at that point. The
only person that could have stopped it was me, and
I didn't do it.
Speaker 1 (43:47):
Look, Farland knew that Reagan trusted him. If he had
stayed by the President's side, maybe he would have succeeded
at extinguishing the Iran initiative for good.
Speaker 17 (43:57):
The President came to office, I think to be a
domestic president, and he never made any pretense at being
a man of great depth on foreign affairs. And for
him to say at the end in tears, but I
never had anybody I could count on as indispensable.
Speaker 13 (44:16):
But you are that guy. Well I was, But.
Speaker 17 (44:25):
From my first time at the Naval Academy. I mean,
it's in your bones. You know what your job is,
serve the country, and don't blame somebody else. Don't make
up pretense, don't figure out some excuse circumstances. It's kind
of blarny. I mean, step up. Now, you can solve
(44:48):
your soul by saying, well, the President asked me to
do it. But if you know, as I knew that
this was not going to work. I don't think there's
any way of salvaging that's that's something that gets sorted
out when you die and it's all over. But you
can at least stand up, tell the truth, take responsibility
(45:14):
and move on, and judgments will be rendered by people
that aren't really qualifyed. Whatever good you did while you
were in government, nobody will remember that. The ending of
the Cold War, bringing down Marxism, Soviet Union, reducing nuclear
(45:37):
weapons for the first time industry, all these things happened,
and nobody knows that and they never will.
Speaker 13 (45:45):
And so.
Speaker 17 (45:47):
Sure, if I had to do again, I would not
have let it go on. But I did, and there's
no changing the facts.
Speaker 8 (46:01):
The changing of the guard today and a top White
House foreign policy job, national Security Advisor, Robert McFarland, resigned
and he was replaced by his deputy.
Speaker 6 (46:10):
Farland was a Kissinger proteget.
Speaker 11 (46:12):
He was appointed National Security Advisor as a quiet team player.
Speaker 1 (46:15):
After McFarland's departure from the White House, talks between Oliver
North and Minuchair Gribonifar did indeed resume, and two months
later more American missiles were on their way to Iran.
(46:41):
On the next episode of Fiasco, the Reagan Administration's War
on Communism arrives secretly in Nicaragua.
Speaker 19 (46:48):
I was confronted with questions which began more or less
as follows, mister ambassador, the CIA has blown up the
bridges connecting Nicaragua and Honduras. What do you think about this?
Start to your investorship.
Speaker 1 (47:07):
For a list of books, articles, and documentary we used
in our research, follow the link in the show notes.
Fiasco is a production of Prologue Projects and it's distributed
by Pushkin Industries. The show is produced by Andrew Parsons,
Madeline kaplan Ula Kulpa and me Leon Mayfock. Our editor
was Camilla Hammer. Our researcher was Francis Carr. Additional archival
(47:29):
research from Caitlin Nicholas. Our music is by Nick Silvester.
Our theme song is by Spatial Relations. Our artwork is
by Teddy Blanks at Chips and y Audio, mixed by
Rob Buyers, Michael Rayphiel and Johnny Vince Evans. Copyright council
provided by Peter Yassi at Yass Butler Plc. Thanks to
Chris weir aviad Ryan Bonnell, Malcolm Burne, Shane Harris, Michael Ledeen,
(47:55):
Howard Titcher, TC Winter, as well as Sam Graham, Felsen,
Saya Shockley, and Katchak and Kova. Special thanks to Luminary
and thank you for listening.
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