May 12, 2025 • 45 mins
How the Iran-Contra hearings made Oliver North an icon, and got Ronald Reagan off the hook.
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Speaker 1 (00:16):
Pushkin From the day the story broke in lebanon early November.
All the possible outcomes and worsening scandal were immediately obvious,
(00:41):
it seemed to me, and I reached the conclusion that
at least if you can't turn things around, maybe you
can atone and I won't develop for you the nature
of depression and how it can worsen and lead to
(01:03):
a cycle of decline. And yet that was what was happening.
Speaker 2 (01:08):
One of the most important figures in the Iran Contra affair,
Robert McFarlan, is in a hospital tonight. The former National
Security advisor apparently took an overdose of valium as an
attempted suicide.
Speaker 3 (01:18):
It was shortly after seven am when Missus McFarland tried
to rouse her husband and couldn't.
Speaker 4 (01:28):
In the months after the Iran Contra scandal broke, Bud
McFarlane had felt a duty to take responsibility for it.
McFarland believed he was the only one in Reagan's inner
circle who could have stopped the arms for Hostages initiative,
and he had failed. Still, McFarland had maintained hope that
the administration could set the scandal aside and recommit itself
(01:51):
to its foreign policy ambitions. If McFarlane could help his
former colleagues in the White House make that happen, maybe
he could set things right.
Speaker 1 (02:00):
Yeah, I still had this foolish I think believe that
we shouldn't close down the government with a scandal in
pre occupation with it when you had other things that
still needed to be done.
Speaker 4 (02:15):
So McFarland wrote down the policy goals he thought the
administration could still pursue.
Speaker 1 (02:20):
The President had achieved quite a lot, that is, he
had teed up opportunities that were enormous, and I wrote
down what ought to be done in four areas where
we would be taking an initiative of importance to our country.
Speaker 4 (02:36):
When he was finished, McFarlane says that he submitted the
memo to the President, the Vice President, and the Secretary
of State.
Speaker 1 (02:43):
But I didn't even get an answer. One of the
three did. I'd forgotten who it was, But I had
no signal that any of it was being considered.
Speaker 5 (02:52):
And so.
Speaker 1 (02:54):
To me, that was kind of a moment of truth
that your best efforts have failed. You have exhausted all
possible recourse for salvaging the considerable gains that could be
made aid and under President Reagan's leadership.
Speaker 4 (03:13):
When McFarland saw that his memo was being ignored, he
became convinced that the promise of the Reagan administration had
been truly squandered and that it was partly his fault. Later,
McFarland explained his decision to try to take his own
life by invoking the Japanese ritual of seppuku, a form
of suicide practiced by disgraced samurai who wanted to restore
(03:35):
honor to their families.
Speaker 1 (03:37):
It was foolish looking back, but no, it has a
tradition in the Far East, and it's just more comment
on how deep the depression had become.
Speaker 4 (03:51):
Around midnight on February eighth, nineteen eighty seven, Bud McFarland
swallowed roughly thirty volume tablets. When his wife woke up
the next morning, she saw that something was wrong and
called an ambulance.
Speaker 3 (04:03):
Missus McFarland was clutching a note from her husband, which
she refused to show to the medics.
Speaker 2 (04:08):
McFarlan has come under increasing strong as the Iran a
fair defense.
Speaker 4 (04:13):
McFarlane, who was forty nine years old, was taken to
a nearby naval hospital to recover. News of McFarland's suicide
attempt came as multiple investigations into Iran Contra were lurching
to life.
Speaker 6 (04:29):
The nation's one hundredth Congress convened today clearly preoccupied with
the Iran Contra crisis.
Speaker 4 (04:35):
The House and the Senate had both formed committees to
look into the matter, and they were preparing for public hearings.
Speaker 6 (04:40):
After a long debate, the Senate finally approved a resolution
authorizing a bipartisan committee to investigate.
Speaker 7 (04:46):
Adopted overwhelmingly bipartisanly by a margin of four hundred and.
Speaker 8 (04:50):
Sixteen to two.
Speaker 7 (04:51):
The House also established its Select Committee.
Speaker 4 (04:54):
While Congress set its inquiry in motion, prosecutors working in
the Office of the Independent Council were undertaking a separate investigation.
Speaker 8 (05:01):
Lawrence Walsh, a former judge and former Deputy Attorney General,
demand to search for any criminal wrongdoing.
Speaker 4 (05:07):
Unlike Congress, the Independent Council was pursuing a criminal probe
intended to identify any illegal acts that may have been
committed as part of Iran contract.
Speaker 7 (05:16):
I think that we have a statutory basis to believe
that a federal law may have been violated.
Speaker 4 (05:22):
And then there was the Tower Commission, a three person
panel appointed by the President that included a former national
security advisor and two former senators.
Speaker 6 (05:30):
Former Texas Senator John Tower, former National Security Advisor Brent Scolcroft,
and former Secretary of State Edmund Muski are.
Speaker 9 (05:37):
The other members.
Speaker 4 (05:38):
Their job was to find out what had gone wrong
in the White House and then share their findings with
the public. The Tower Commission was most focused on the
National Security Council.
Speaker 2 (05:47):
The panel reportably has expanded its investigation to include possible
attempts to cover up the scandal.
Speaker 4 (05:54):
Looking back, it's no surprise McFarland's foreign policy memo didn't
get more attention. Reagan was under siege and the notion
that he could just set the scandal aside and get
back to business was wishful thinking. As Congress prepared to
hold hearings, the American public wanted answers. What had the
President known about Iran Contra, when did he know it?
(06:18):
And had he lied to cover it up. I'm Leon
Nafok from Prolog Projects and Pushkin Industries. This is fiasco
Iran contract.
Speaker 8 (06:27):
The full story of the Iran Contra affair begins to
unfold for all of us to see.
Speaker 10 (06:33):
Colonel lath please rise.
Speaker 3 (06:34):
Oliver North has become the hottest tickets in town.
Speaker 7 (06:37):
The man's become an instant celebrity.
Speaker 2 (06:39):
I mispled the Congress secrecy, deception, and disdain for the law.
Speaker 11 (06:44):
We were shocked. To this day, I'm shocked.
Speaker 12 (06:47):
Millions of Americans have a nagging suspicion that the truth
has not yet come out.
Speaker 4 (06:54):
Episode six fault Lines, The Iran Contra goes on trial
as each of its principal architects takes a turn fielding
the blame. We'll be right back, Bud. McFarlane ended up
(07:16):
spending about two weeks in the hospital. During his recovery,
he received several notable visits. One was from former President
Richard Nixon, who gave McFarland advice on overcoming adversity and
living with one's mistakes. McFarland was also visited by the
three members of the Tower Commission, who interviewed him in
his hospital room for more than six hours. They were
(07:39):
particularly interested in whether Reagan had pre approved the very
first arm sales to Iran. McFarlane told them he had.
Just a few days later, the Tower Commission released its
report on Iran Contra, It was more than three hundred
pages long, and its conclusions were not flattering to the president.
Speaker 13 (07:59):
The Special Review Board has completed its work, but it
might be helpful to give you the highlights of this
rather lengthy report to the president.
Speaker 4 (08:08):
At a press conference, the commission's chairman and namesake, John
Tower detailed the president's failings as a manager. Though most
of the bad ideas had come from Reagan's subordinates, Tower
said it was his job to watch what they were
doing and rain them in.
Speaker 13 (08:22):
Now you can say that perhaps this president holds himself
a little bit too aloof from the implementation of policy.
But one thing is very very clear that members of
the system who were privied of what was going on
failed to the president because the president clearly didn't understand.
Speaker 2 (08:40):
And the President of the United States is described here
generally as a man who just simply was not very
much in control of the foreign policy apparatus of his administration.
Speaker 4 (08:49):
The Tower report would not be the final verdict underran contract.
There were still congressional hearings ahead, as well as potential
indictments coming out of the Independent Council's Office, but for
the time being, the report spoke loudly here was a
panel created by the President, and the best thing they
could say about him was that he was out to lunch.
Speaker 3 (09:13):
This is an NBCU special President Reagan's response to the
Tower Commission report. I.
Speaker 14 (09:22):
Fellow Americans, I've spoken to you from this historic office
on many occasions and about many things.
Speaker 4 (09:27):
On March fourth, nineteen eighty seven, Reagan delivered a primetime
speech in response to the Tower Board's findings.
Speaker 14 (09:34):
For the past three months, I've been silent on the
revelations about Iran, and you must have been thinking of
why doesn't he tell us what's happening. But I've had
to wait, as you have, for the complete story.
Speaker 4 (09:46):
Reagan called the Tower report honest, convincing, and highly critical.
Then he referred back to his first public statements about
the scandal, it admitted that they had been inaccurate.
Speaker 14 (09:57):
A few months ago, I told the American people, I
did not trade arms for hostages. My heart and my
best intentions still tell me that's true. But the facts
and the evidence tell me it is. Not reasons why
it happened, but no excuses. It was a mistake.
Speaker 4 (10:15):
But the time for candid self reflection had passed. As
much as Reagan may have wanted to move on from
Iran Contra. The scrutiny was only going to intensify as
Congress prepared for televised hearings.
Speaker 5 (10:27):
The public and the press wanted to know what the
hell happened, how high it went, who was responsible for it,
and was there anything that we didn't know.
Speaker 4 (10:36):
This is John Neilds. He's a former prosecutor who was
hired by House Democrats as chief counsel to lead their
investigation and question witnesses during the hearings.
Speaker 5 (10:46):
Our job was to tell the story in a way
that people could figure out for themselves what things were wrong,
what things were arguably wrong and arguably right, and what
things were fine.
Speaker 4 (10:58):
It's important to note that these were not impeachment hearings.
Neilds was convinced it was highly unlikely that Congress would
ever take that step. Reagan was too popular and his
second term was almost up anyway. Also, Neilds thought it
was pretty clear that whatever Reagan did, his intentions had
not been malevolent. There was one circumstance in which Congress
(11:21):
might consider impeachment. According to Neilds, the ranking Republican on
the committee, Warren Rudman, took the view that impeachment would
only be appropriate if Reagan had personally authorized the diversion.
Speaker 5 (11:33):
He made it the only issue on which Reagan could
be impeached. He really wanted to find out as soon
as possible the facts that, in his mind would answer
the question, is anything impeachable happened here?
Speaker 2 (11:46):
And this survey finds that public skepticism is now very deep,
and forty one percent think that President Reagan should resign
if it turns out he knew that money was being
diverted to the Nicaraguan contras.
Speaker 4 (11:59):
But as Neil saw it, the diversion, the hyphen at
the center of Iran contra was only a shiny object,
a diversion, you might say, from everything else that was
wrong with the Iran weapons program and the country war individually.
Speaker 5 (12:12):
Knowing whether the president was responsible for the diversion was
probably the most exciting question that we had to deal with.
I don't think it has an awful lot to do
with answering the question of whether this was a shocking
and really serious a breakdown in the way our government functioned.
(12:37):
That's what I thought this was about.
Speaker 12 (12:39):
Millions of Americans have a nagging suspicion that the truth
has not yet come out.
Speaker 15 (12:46):
Three branches must be involved in the governing of the
people of this country, and when one branch goes all
wild without even including consultation with the other branches, that
spells trouble.
Speaker 4 (13:07):
It's hard to overstate how huge an undertake these hearings were.
Before Congress could publicly question a single witness, Meals and
his team of investigators had to obtain documents, take depositions,
and figure out which leads to pursue. That meant probing
multiple government agencies, including the National Security Council, the State Department,
(13:27):
the Pentagon, the Justice Department, and the White House itself.
Then there was the international angle. The Nicaraguin thread alone
involved members of the Contras who were based in Honduras
and Costa Rica. On the Iran side of things, the
investigators would have to make contact with Middle Eastern arms
dealers and Israeli diplomats. It was hard to say where
the trail would take them, but even in the simplest scenario,
(13:51):
Meals and his colleagues were going to have to trace
millions of dollars moving through a maze of Swiss bank accounts,
shell companies, and foreign countries.
Speaker 3 (13:58):
The Senate, so like Comeree voted today to order General
Richard Seacourt to disclose records of Swiss bank accounts he holds.
Speaker 1 (14:04):
See what happened to the money, who set the accounts up,
who had access to the accounts, how much more when
it was in the accounts, and where do the money
go now?
Speaker 5 (14:12):
This was a set of issues that if I had
been in an assistant US attorney, as I had been
previously in my life, I would have looked at this
as a one or two year investigation before you could
say you've done your job. And it was very clear
that we were only going to have a matter of months.
Speaker 4 (14:33):
The time crunch was the result of a compromise between
Democratic and Republican leaders in Congress. As you might imagine,
Republicans wanted to get the hearings over and done with
as quickly as possible, while Democrats argued for letting them
go on as long as they needed to. Hanging over
this procedural debate was the upcoming presidential election, in which
(14:54):
Ronald Reagan's vice President, George H. W. Bush was expected
to run. In the end, it was decided that Congress
would have until August to get through the hearings. Here
is Pam Nonton, who worked on the House investigation with
John Nields.
Speaker 11 (15:09):
It did make more difficult because when you put an
end date on the investigation before you've even begun it,
how in the world do you know how long it
will take. It may take less than that, may take
more than that. You go where the evidence leads, you
don't just stop.
Speaker 4 (15:25):
The team divided the case up into silos and assigned
investigators to each one. Notton, for instance, was put on
the Department of Justice, which meant she was looking into
the weekend fact finding mission you heard about in our
previous episode.
Speaker 11 (15:37):
I mean, obviously I was there to investigate what the
Attorney General did when this first broke his quote unquote
investigation to you know, get their quote get their arms
around the facts, but also the broader issue of what
did the Department of Justice know about the arms sale?
(16:00):
So it was sort of a wide swath of things
because it involved different divisions of the department.
Speaker 4 (16:09):
The clock ticked, Nilds and his team encountered an obstacle
that was no less daunting than their deadline. Their two
would be star witnesses, Oliver North and his supervisor John
Poindexter were going to plead the Fifth North and Poindexter
would refuse to testify at the hearings unless Congress gave
them immunity. That meant guaranteeing that North and Poindexter's words
(16:32):
would not be used against them in a criminal inquiry.
The situation put Neilds and his team on a collision
course with the other big Iran contraprobe in Town, the
Independent Council, Lawrence Walsh.
Speaker 7 (16:44):
In a strongly worded letter accompanied by a legal memo,
Walsh urges the House Committee not to grant witnesses immunity
until after his work is done. To do so, he writes,
would quote create serious and perhaps insurmountable barriers to the
prosecution of the witnesses.
Speaker 4 (16:59):
Walsh's mandate was to identify any criminal wrongdoing that may
have occurred as part of Iran Contra. That was why
North and Poindexter wanted immunity. If they could get it,
nothing they said to Congress could be used against them
in an indictment.
Speaker 7 (17:13):
And that the prosecution would have to prove its case
was based on other information.
Speaker 4 (17:17):
As a former prosecutor, John Neilds understood how much harder
that would make it for Walsh to build cases, but
in the end he supported the grant of immunity.
Speaker 5 (17:27):
I felt conflicted. I knew that something good was going
to come out of it, which was what I thought
was the more important good, which is the public is
going to learn everything.
Speaker 2 (17:37):
The Congressional committee's investigating the scandal formally approved a plan
for a limited immunity for these two men, John Poindexter
and Oliver.
Speaker 8 (17:44):
North, and here on Capitol Hill today, after months of expectation,
the full story of the Iran Contra affair begins to
unfold for all of us to see.
Speaker 4 (18:00):
The Iran contray hearings opened on May fifth, nineteen eighty seven,
a little more than six months after the scandal broke.
They were run by a joint committee, meaning the House
and the Senate were combining their investigations so that witnesses
wouldn't have to testify twice.
Speaker 10 (18:16):
The joint hearings of the House Select Committee to Investigate
Covert Arms Transaction with Iran and the Senate Select Committee
on Secret Military Assistance to Iran and the Nicaraguan Opposition
will come to order.
Speaker 4 (18:30):
The first witness would be retired Major General Richard Seacord,
who had overseen logistics for both the Contra war and
the Iran weapons program.
Speaker 8 (18:38):
A key figure who has not been heard from before,
began to tell the committees of his own involvement in
sending arms to Iran and in helping the countries in
Central Americas.
Speaker 4 (18:48):
Seacord did not demand immunity in exchange for his testimony.
He insisted that his involvement was that of a private
citizen and a businessman. He told the committee about how
his operation had worked and said he thought he was
just carrying out the president's policy.
Speaker 16 (19:03):
The president has certain rights in the foreign policy area.
I never saw myself as being foreign policy operative.
Speaker 12 (19:13):
You saw nothing wrong with this operation.
Speaker 16 (19:15):
I did not see anything wrong with it.
Speaker 4 (19:17):
Then, Seacord seemed sensitive to suggestions that he had only
gotten involved in ron Contra to make money.
Speaker 16 (19:23):
There was no intention of profiteerian. I know that some
people were tossing this word around right now, and I
resent it.
Speaker 3 (19:33):
If Seacord wasn't doing all this for profit, why wouldn't
he turnover records of his Swiss bank accounts.
Speaker 16 (19:38):
I relied on the advice of my accounsel. Let's get
off the subject.
Speaker 17 (19:42):
You're making the rulings.
Speaker 16 (19:44):
No, sir, but I did not come here.
Speaker 18 (19:46):
To be badger.
Speaker 4 (19:51):
Seacord's testimony set the tone for the rest of the hearings.
Bud McFarland testified next.
Speaker 19 (19:56):
Our witness this morning is mister Robert Carl McFarlane, the
former National Security Advisor to the President.
Speaker 4 (20:04):
When McFarland was asked about Oliver North's destruction of documents,
the term shredding party was introduced into the national lexicon.
Speaker 17 (20:12):
Colonel North tell you when the car that there was
going to be a shredding party that weekend.
Speaker 1 (20:21):
Well, just that there had to be one, the attorney.
Speaker 4 (20:27):
By the end of May nineteen eighty seven, the Iran
contry hearings were becoming a national obsession. This is a
song from a late night Cinemax show called This Week
Indoors Document.
Speaker 13 (20:40):
Peoples Have Not.
Speaker 4 (20:43):
As the hearings continued, the witnesses just kept getting more exciting.
About a month then America met Oliver North's personal secretary,
Fawn Hall.
Speaker 8 (20:52):
She is twenty seven years old. She went to high
school in Virginia and then on to finishing school and
of course in modeling.
Speaker 4 (20:59):
Hall is blonde and striking. As it turned out, she
was a former model.
Speaker 3 (21:04):
Fawn Hall's appearance on Capitol Hill was a media event.
She was surrounded by cameras and security men.
Speaker 7 (21:10):
Paul read an opening statement, making as clear as she
could that despite her looks, she is not just a
pretty face.
Speaker 17 (21:16):
And perform my duties in exemplary manner.
Speaker 19 (21:19):
I can type.
Speaker 7 (21:20):
That last, of course, a reference to congressional sex scandals
involving secretaries who admitted they could not type.
Speaker 4 (21:26):
Hall's looks were not the only reason people were anticipating
her testimony. They also wanted to know about the so
called shredding party that she and North allegedly collaborated on
after the Iran scandal broke.
Speaker 2 (21:36):
Fawn Hall told how she altered and shredded key documents
a secretary to Lieutenant Colonel Oliver North at the White.
Speaker 20 (21:43):
House, and as he pulled documents from each dower and
placed on top of the shredder, I inserted them into
the shredder.
Speaker 4 (21:51):
Hall also testified to sneaking documents out of North's office
by stuffing them in her clothes.
Speaker 16 (21:56):
And then you proceeded to remove documents from your boots
and from other parts of your clothing.
Speaker 17 (22:02):
Is that correct?
Speaker 11 (22:03):
That's correct?
Speaker 4 (22:04):
Her more than anything. Fawn Hall's testimony was about defending
Oliver North. He portrayed the colonel as a patriot, a
hard working idealist whose only goal was to protect the
United States. According to Hall, everything North did, including the
destruction of documents, was done in the name of American interests.
Speaker 17 (22:24):
And did you.
Speaker 13 (22:26):
Surmise that this was a way of trying to cover
up something in conjunction with the Iran initiative or the
Contra initiative.
Speaker 11 (22:34):
I do not use the word cover up. I would
use the word protect.
Speaker 4 (22:40):
Vawn Hall wasn't the only witness to go to bat
for North. One of the Contra leaders flew in to
testify as well. And even though most of what he
had to say implicated North in Contra activities, what stuck
out was the ardor with which he defended North's character
and dedication to the anti communist cause.
Speaker 17 (22:57):
I have and still have high respect for Colonel North.
But there was a group saying that they were going
to erect a monument for Colonel North once that Mikaraua
was liberated.
Speaker 9 (23:08):
Would it be possible to make a brief quote statement,
And I will ask before I read it. It's a
poem that.
Speaker 4 (23:13):
Then North assistant Robert Owen ended his closing statement by
reading a poem.
Speaker 9 (23:18):
Ali, your enemies are more clever and more treacherous than ours.
Yet you have given all you had to give. We
have so very little to give you in return. Yet
we want you to know that in our hearts and
our prayers, you're with us daily. You're giving our children
a chance to live as free individuals. And for these
things we say thank you, Oli North. And I can
only add that I love Oli North like a brother,
(23:41):
and I want to thank the committee.
Speaker 4 (23:42):
For all this fanfare around Oliver North, who had been
refusing to testify, built anticipation for the moment when the
man himself would finally appear before the committee and give
his side of the story.
Speaker 3 (23:53):
Oliver North, after months of delaying and stonewalling, finally goes
before Congress tomorrow.
Speaker 15 (23:58):
Ifty nine percent of those surveyed thank North will lie
to Congressional committees investigating the scandal when he begins testifying Tuesday.
Speaker 4 (24:05):
The summer of Iran Contra war on North had everyone's
attention a lot.
Speaker 6 (24:10):
In the history of Congress have so many lawmakers been
so interested in what our lieutenant colonel in the Marine
Corps has to say, well, the swashbuckling marine who once
declared without complaint that.
Speaker 3 (24:20):
He was ready to be the pall guy d day
is at hand.
Speaker 10 (24:30):
The hurrying will please come to order.
Speaker 4 (24:32):
On the morning of July seventh, nineteen eighty seven, Oliver
North sat before the Congressional Committee waiting for his testimony
to begin. He wore his marine uniform, proudly displaying the
ribbons and medals he had earned in Vietnam, including two
purple hearts and a silver Star North Saltan Pepper hare
was neatly parted, and he sat straight up with his
(24:52):
jaw squared.
Speaker 20 (24:53):
Colonel Law, please rise.
Speaker 4 (24:55):
He looked young and almost indecently handsome. Here's Pam Nawton again.
Speaker 11 (25:00):
When he took the oa with all the cameras started snapping,
as like a whole flock of birds of descended upon
the room.
Speaker 10 (25:10):
Do you solemnly where that in the testimony you're about
to give will be the proof the whole pooth and nothing.
Speaker 4 (25:19):
Remember, North's testimony was being shown live on television, and
Noughton believes that the camera angles affected the way he
was perceived.
Speaker 11 (25:27):
They had placed a third camera on the floor so
that you could sort of see him sitting over the camera,
and it made him much larger than he was in person.
He's a rather slight man, but on TV, because of
the angle of the camera, he looked, you know, heroic
(25:48):
and huge and strong.
Speaker 4 (25:51):
John Neilds was first up to question North, and North
did not waste any time telegraphing his attitude about what
was going on.
Speaker 21 (25:58):
Colonel North, you were involved in two operations of this
government of great significance to the people of this country.
Speaker 9 (26:06):
Is that correct?
Speaker 21 (26:08):
At least two, yes, sir, And these operations were carried
out in.
Speaker 14 (26:15):
Secret, we hoped so.
Speaker 4 (26:19):
Neilds began with a line of questioning about why North
had felt it was proper to keep his activities secret
and to destroy evidence after the fact. North's response was
that he couldn't risk the possibility of America's adversaries getting
their hands on classified information. Neilds pressed him, But it.
Speaker 21 (26:35):
Was designed to be kept a secret from the American people.
Speaker 20 (26:39):
I think what is important, mister neild says, that we
somehow arrive at some kind of an understanding right here
and now as to what a covert operation is. I mean,
if we could find a way to insulate with a
bubble over these hearings that are being broadcast in Moscow
and talk about covert operations to the American people without
(27:02):
it getting into the hands of our adversaries. I'm sure
we would do that.
Speaker 4 (27:06):
Neilds was trying to make an argument that in retrospect
he feels like he didn't quite get a in the
heat of the moment.
Speaker 5 (27:12):
What the reason this was covert was not because we
were afraid our enemies would find out about it, was
we're afraid of the American people were going to find
out about it. Lots of it was unlawful, and that
he's going to wrap himself in God country and flag
as a justification for telling lies about stuff.
Speaker 4 (27:33):
The contrast between North and Neilds was almost cartoonish. North
looked like g I. Joe Well. Neilds was more like
a pencil necked, long haired graduate student, and though North
went out of his way to punctuate his comments with
polite formalities, the mutual hostility between the two men was obvious.
It didn't help that North's lawyer, Brendan Sullivan, was regularly
(27:55):
interrupting neils and raising objections.
Speaker 21 (27:57):
Objection, how many times do we have to have the
question answer, asked mister chairman.
Speaker 4 (28:01):
At one point, North and Sullivan seemed to be mocking
Neils from their table. Neilds was frustrated, Well.
Speaker 15 (28:08):
What is your question, council?
Speaker 21 (28:15):
Have you forgotten the question?
Speaker 19 (28:16):
All I have? And I have to make objections?
Speaker 22 (28:19):
So you ask it again?
Speaker 21 (28:20):
And you did, and it was overruled, and the question stands.
I'd like the witness to answer it if he remembers.
Speaker 20 (28:26):
It, could we He obviously doesn't remember it.
Speaker 13 (28:28):
He just asked you to repeat it.
Speaker 21 (28:29):
May yeah you did, he did not, Sir, do you
remember the question?
Speaker 20 (28:39):
My memory has been shredded, if you would be so
kind as to repeat the question.
Speaker 4 (28:44):
Pam Norton, the congressional investigator working under Neild's, was taken
aback by North's demeanor.
Speaker 11 (28:50):
I remember after about an hour or so, John Yild said, well,
we're going to take a break now, but when we
come back, I'm going to ask you about X Y Z,
and North said something the effective, Oh, I can hardly wait.
Speaker 21 (29:01):
When we get back, I am going to ask you
some questions relating to those transactions.
Speaker 20 (29:07):
That's a cliffhanger of an ending.
Speaker 4 (29:10):
When the committee took a short break, notting and some
of our colleagues whispered to each other about North's performance.
Speaker 11 (29:16):
We were saying to ourselves, behind the dice, boy, he's
really coming off like a jerk.
Speaker 4 (29:22):
But then an ABC News reporter named Britt Hume checked
in with the committee lawyers and set them straight.
Speaker 11 (29:28):
You know, we said, what do you think, and he goes,
I think he's a jerk, he said, but he's coming
off great on TV. We're getting flooded with calls. People
love him.
Speaker 4 (29:40):
At the same time, committee members were also getting a
sense of how well North was playing with the folks
watching at home.
Speaker 11 (29:46):
The members went back to their offices and were finding
that their switchboards were getting flooded with calls of people
who loved this handsome Lieutenant Kernel.
Speaker 3 (29:55):
With all of his medals, all of the North seems
to have much of the nation in the palm of
his hand.
Speaker 4 (30:02):
Over the course of his six days of testimony, North
developed a true fan base.
Speaker 23 (30:08):
Of those surveyed North as a patriot and hero, forty
eight percent believe North is being harassed by the congressional panels,
and twenty eight percent say they would enthusiastically support North
if he ran for public office.
Speaker 4 (30:23):
Journalists were happy to embrace the public affection for North,
evidently relieved to have a real leading man in the
Iran Contra crisis. The media took to calling him by
his nickname Ali, and before long everyone was talking about
Ali Mania.
Speaker 13 (30:38):
Movies, lectures, Millingham dollar, book contracts.
Speaker 7 (30:41):
The Washington Post ran a lengthy analysis of Colonel North's face.
Speaker 4 (30:44):
The three major news networks canceled regularly scheduled programming to
show north testimony. Gavel to Gavel, a bar maid near Boston,
had expected to dislike Colonel North.
Speaker 22 (30:54):
After watching the testimony, I began to dislike the committee
that was questioning him.
Speaker 18 (30:59):
I felt though they were conducting a witch hunt.
Speaker 11 (31:02):
His brush is in that uniform, the.
Speaker 6 (31:03):
Real hero, and I'm with you one hundred percent, And
I'm Glady of the American mine.
Speaker 20 (31:08):
And I'm proud of it.
Speaker 4 (31:11):
By the third day of North's testimony, thousands of telegrams
have been sent to the White House, very few of
them critical. Flowers for North arrived daily to the Senate
Office building.
Speaker 5 (31:23):
Oliver North has become the hottest tickets.
Speaker 9 (31:25):
In town or Oliver North's t shirts.
Speaker 17 (31:28):
There is talk of an Oliver North doll.
Speaker 4 (31:30):
Barber's offered Ali North style haircuts Oli for President merch
sprang up across the country.
Speaker 22 (31:35):
Ali Berger served up with shredded lettuce, shredded cheese, and
of course topped with an American flag.
Speaker 13 (31:42):
Let's place it lovely more Haitian.
Speaker 19 (31:44):
The man's become an instant celebrity.
Speaker 8 (31:46):
You think of another country where that had happened.
Speaker 4 (31:53):
John Nields, the long haired lawyer for the House Democrats,
remembers North's popularity rising at his expense.
Speaker 5 (31:59):
I found out that there were a significant portion of
the world that thought Ali North was a cool guy,
and that I wasn't a cool guy.
Speaker 4 (32:09):
But Neil's got the appeal and he understood the dynamic.
Speaker 5 (32:13):
This was Vietnam right. I don't know what it is now,
maybe it's immigration or something, but the left right thing
was Vietnam, and he was playing to the people who
felt dissed, their patriotism had been disrespected after Vietnam, and
that the country had abandoned them in the middle of
(32:35):
a war, and who left them to die and come
home as anything other than heroes. And I understand that
very well. I mean, I thought the Vietnam War was
a big, big mistake, and so if he was trying
to pitch me as one of those people. It would
(32:57):
be truthful.
Speaker 4 (32:58):
Pam Norton says, the deluge of calls and letters had
an immediate effect on the committee member's line of questioning.
Speaker 11 (33:05):
And that's when they basically stopped asking, you know, questions,
just the natural fear of a member. Whenever you put
a question in front of them, the member would say, well,
what's he going to say? Well, I don't know what
he's going to say. That's why it's an investigation. And
they wouldn't do it, not with the witness who had
that much public powerful sway.
Speaker 4 (33:26):
At that point, the softballs the North was getting from
the committee members stood in stark contrast to the grilling
he received from Neils.
Speaker 5 (33:34):
That's sort of the end of his questioning. I asked
him about lying to Congress.
Speaker 4 (33:40):
North was defiant.
Speaker 20 (33:41):
I think we can abbreviate this in hopes that we
can move on so that I can finish this week.
Speaker 5 (33:46):
But almost like proud of himself, I will tell you
right now, Council, and all the members here gathered.
Speaker 20 (33:53):
And all the members here gathered that.
Speaker 5 (33:56):
I misled the CONGRESSSS I.
Speaker 16 (33:59):
Missed at that meeting.
Speaker 21 (34:01):
At that meeting face to face, face to face.
Speaker 5 (34:04):
You made false statements to them about your activities in
support of the contries I did. I mean, it's who
he is and he was telling the truth then, so
that's again credit for that's good.
Speaker 4 (34:22):
One thing that was interesting about Oliver North's testimony was that,
as unapologetic as he was, he didn't exactly take the
blame for the scandal. In fact, he made it clear
over and over again that even though he stood by
everything he had done, he'd also just been following orders
like a good marine.
Speaker 20 (34:39):
I was simply a staff member with a demonstrated ability
to get the job done. I reported directly to mister
McFarland and to Admiral Poindexter. My authority to act always flowed,
I believe from my superiors. My military training inculcated in
me a strong belief in the chain of command, and
so far as I can recall, I always acted on
(35:01):
major matters with specific approval, after informing my superiors of
the facts as I knew them, the risks and the
potential benefits.
Speaker 4 (35:11):
This testimony fed into the big question coursing through the
Iran Contra hearings. How much had the President known specifically
what had he known about the diversion of funds from
the Iran operation to the contrace. The person best position
to answer this question was John Poindexter, Oliver North's boss
and the National Security advisor at the time of the
(35:32):
nineteen eighty six arm shipments.
Speaker 24 (35:34):
Sword says he had sent Poindexter five memos seeking President
Reagan's approval for the diversion. Nord says he doesn't know
if they reached the President. So committee members will ask Poindexter.
Speaker 4 (35:51):
We'll be right back.
Speaker 19 (35:59):
The committees meet this morning to hear the testimony of
Admiral John Poindexter. Admiral would you please rise to take
the oath?
Speaker 4 (36:08):
John Poindexter, who had resigned as Reagan's National Security advisor
over Iran contra, took the stand on July fifteenth, right
after North. Poindexter was more subdued than North, but came
across as similarly unrepentant, stating flatly that he had been
hoping to withhold information from Congress.
Speaker 18 (36:28):
It wasn't withholding it from the American people. It was
that there were a lot of opponents in the Congress
that would have not agreed with our interpretation of the
Bowld amendment, they wouldn't have agreed to the Iranian project,
and if it came out, it was going to be
(36:50):
a very hot political issue and it would be used
to pound on the president.
Speaker 4 (36:55):
Then it came time for Poindexter to answer the million
dollar question. Taking intermittent puffs on his pipe, he explained
that none of his superiors, including President Reagan, had been
aware of the diversion of Iran weapons profits to the Contras.
To drive the point home, Poindexter invoked Harry Truman's famous
line about accountability.
Speaker 18 (37:16):
I think it's, you know, an important point here is
on this whole issue. You know, the buck stops here
with me.
Speaker 5 (37:24):
I made the decision.
Speaker 18 (37:25):
I felt that I had the authority to do it.
I was convinced that the President would in the end
think it was a good idea, but I did not
want him to be associated with the decision.
Speaker 4 (37:41):
John Neilds told me he still thinks about Poindexter's answer,
and he still doesn't know what to make of it.
On the one hand, Poindexter was testifying plainly that he
did not tell Reagan about the diversion. On the other hand,
he was admitting that his goal had been to give
the president deniability.
Speaker 5 (37:59):
He was telling them my role in life, according to
my lights, is to take the blame so that the
president doesn't have to And there could be two ways
of doing that. One not tell the president and not
tell the truth. Here, those are the two different ways. Well,
(38:21):
it goes without saying I have no idea whether he
told the truth or not. And I think that's what
everybody thought, what that they didn't know whether Poindexter told
the truth.
Speaker 4 (38:36):
After Poindexter's testimony, the three news networks began rotating coverage
of the hearings and resumed their regularly scheduled programming. By
eliminating the possibility that Reagan would be personally linked to
the diversion, Poindexter had effectively closed the case and take
an impeachment off the table.
Speaker 7 (38:54):
The scandal is largely over.
Speaker 3 (38:56):
Some committee members say this is a suspense novel which
has lost a suspense. That may be one reason the
committee now hopes to wrap up its work a week
early by the end of July.
Speaker 4 (39:07):
Pam Nawton remembers thinking about how differently all Over North
and John Poindexter had approached the issue of responsibility. Poindexter
had at least made a show of owning the diversion. North,
on the other hand, had emphasized his status as a
low level operative carrying out a mission handed to him
from on high.
Speaker 11 (39:25):
To this day, I'm shocked because he is still viewed
in many segments of the right as this hero this
heroic guy. The truth of the matter is, he took
the Fifth Amendment. He only testified with the grant of
immunity with a deal. And if you listen to his testimony,
(39:47):
he pointed the finger upward. He said he believed the
President of the United States knew what he was doing.
He was a snitch essentially in common parlance. And it
was Poindexter, his boss, that took the bullet. It's Poindexter
who came in a regular street suit, not an admiral uniform,
(40:12):
and basically said, the buck stops here. I didn't discuss
it with the President. I take the bullet.
Speaker 4 (40:29):
After the hearings ended, the Congressional Committee wrote up their
findings and published them that November in a six hundred
and ninety page report.
Speaker 2 (40:37):
Good Morning, the Joint House and Senate committees which investigated
the Iran Contra affair today issue their majority report, a
six hundred and ninety page document that does not produce
a smoking god.
Speaker 4 (40:49):
And the committee's conclusions were quite different than the Tower
Commission's report released earlier in the year.
Speaker 6 (40:54):
It was, in the opinion of the majority who signed
this report the President who had set the tone allowing
a cabal of Zealotz to seize control.
Speaker 19 (41:02):
The common ingredients in the Iran Contra affair were secrecy, deception,
and a disdain for law.
Speaker 4 (41:10):
The report was particularly critical of the White House's and
runs around Congress.
Speaker 10 (41:14):
They conducted a secret foreign policy and concealed it through
a concerted campaign of dishonesty and deception, and when the
affair began to unravel, they attempted to cover up their deeds.
Speaker 4 (41:27):
But a group of eight Republicans who had served in
the committee refused to sign on to the verdict.
Speaker 6 (41:32):
Included in the final report is a minority section which
accuses the committees of reaching hysterical conclusions.
Speaker 7 (41:39):
It started out as a witch hunt, it proceeded as
a witch hunt, and the final report indicates that indeed
it was a witch.
Speaker 4 (41:47):
Hunt led by a Wyoming Congressman named Dick Cheney. The
Republican dissenters published their own report, making the case not
only for Reagan's innocence, but for the innocence of his
entire administration. They said there was no systematic disrespect for
the rule of law, no grand conspiracy, and no administration
wide dishonesty or cover up. In their opinion, the majority's
(42:10):
conclusions were hysterical.
Speaker 22 (42:12):
I think what the president was guildia was making an
unwise decisions, such as sending arms to Iran. But I
think he had the legal authority to do that. I
think he had the legal authority to withhold notification from Congress.
I don't think those decisions were always why.
Speaker 4 (42:24):
Cheney and the other seven Republicans argued that the real
fault for Iran contra lay with the congressman who had
pushed for the restrictions on contra funding. It was a
robust defense of executive authority won that Dick Cheney would
later echo as Vice President. By the time Congress wrapped
(42:45):
up its work, there was one politician besides Ronald Reagan
who remained unscathed. George H. W. Bush had been director
of the CIA before becoming Vice president. He had set
in on many high level meetings involving national security during
the Reagan years, but The committee report was inconclusive on
what Bush knew about Iran Contra.
Speaker 6 (43:05):
The committees concluded that there is no evidence that Vice
President Bush knew about the diversion.
Speaker 4 (43:11):
In the fall of nineteen eighty seven, when the report
was released, Bush was on to bigger and better things.
I am here today to announce my candidacy for President
of the United States. When asked about Iran Contra in interviews,
Bush insisted that he had been out of the loop. However,
(43:33):
Bush told The Washington Post if he were ever to
find himself in Ronald Reagan's position, he would expect his
staff to give him the facts. I wouldn't want somebody,
he said, to protect me from myself. On the next
(43:54):
episode of Fiasco, Iran Contra goes to Hollywood.
Speaker 1 (43:58):
Ali, you can't lie to your own people.
Speaker 12 (44:00):
It's not a lie.
Speaker 14 (44:01):
It's a Cocord operation. Hostage lives depend on what we
do here Eric.
Speaker 4 (44:07):
For a list of books, articles, and documentaries used in
our research, follow the link in the show notes. Fiasco
is a production of Prolog Projects, and it's distributed by
Pushkin Industries. Shows produced by Andrew Parsons, madelin kaplan Ula, Kulpa,
and me Leon Mayfock. Our editor was Camilla Hammer. Our
researcher was Francis Carr. Additional archival research from Caitlin Nicholas.
(44:31):
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 Rayphield
and Johnny Vince Evans. Copyright council provided by Peter Yassi
at Yassi Butler Plc. Thanks to Lee Hamilton, Amy Freed,
Brendan Sullivan, Melissa Kaplan, Harold Coe, as well as Sam
(44:54):
gram Felsen, Sireya Shackley and Katya Kumkova. Special thanks to
Luminary and thank you for listening. Binge the entire season
(45:17):
of Fiasco Iran Contra ad free by subscribing to Pushkin Plus.
Sign up on the Fiasco show page on Apple Podcasts
or at pushkin dot Fm slash Plus. Pushkin Plus subscribers
can access ad free episodes, full audiobooks, exclusive binges, and
bonus content for all Pushkin podcasts
Pushkin From the day the story broke in lebanon early November.
All the possible outcomes and worsening scandal were immediately obvious,
(00:41):
it seemed to me, and I reached the conclusion that
at least if you can't turn things around, maybe you
can atone and I won't develop for you the nature
of depression and how it can worsen and lead to
(01:03):
a cycle of decline. And yet that was what was happening.
Speaker 2 (01:08):
One of the most important figures in the Iran Contra affair,
Robert McFarlan, is in a hospital tonight. The former National
Security advisor apparently took an overdose of valium as an
attempted suicide.
Speaker 3 (01:18):
It was shortly after seven am when Missus McFarland tried
to rouse her husband and couldn't.
Speaker 4 (01:28):
In the months after the Iran Contra scandal broke, Bud
McFarlane had felt a duty to take responsibility for it.
McFarland believed he was the only one in Reagan's inner
circle who could have stopped the arms for Hostages initiative,
and he had failed. Still, McFarland had maintained hope that
the administration could set the scandal aside and recommit itself
(01:51):
to its foreign policy ambitions. If McFarlane could help his
former colleagues in the White House make that happen, maybe
he could set things right.
Speaker 1 (02:00):
Yeah, I still had this foolish I think believe that
we shouldn't close down the government with a scandal in
pre occupation with it when you had other things that
still needed to be done.
Speaker 4 (02:15):
So McFarland wrote down the policy goals he thought the
administration could still pursue.
Speaker 1 (02:20):
The President had achieved quite a lot, that is, he
had teed up opportunities that were enormous, and I wrote
down what ought to be done in four areas where
we would be taking an initiative of importance to our country.
Speaker 4 (02:36):
When he was finished, McFarlane says that he submitted the
memo to the President, the Vice President, and the Secretary
of State.
Speaker 1 (02:43):
But I didn't even get an answer. One of the
three did. I'd forgotten who it was, But I had
no signal that any of it was being considered.
Speaker 5 (02:52):
And so.
Speaker 1 (02:54):
To me, that was kind of a moment of truth
that your best efforts have failed. You have exhausted all
possible recourse for salvaging the considerable gains that could be
made aid and under President Reagan's leadership.
Speaker 4 (03:13):
When McFarland saw that his memo was being ignored, he
became convinced that the promise of the Reagan administration had
been truly squandered and that it was partly his fault. Later,
McFarland explained his decision to try to take his own
life by invoking the Japanese ritual of seppuku, a form
of suicide practiced by disgraced samurai who wanted to restore
(03:35):
honor to their families.
Speaker 1 (03:37):
It was foolish looking back, but no, it has a
tradition in the Far East, and it's just more comment
on how deep the depression had become.
Speaker 4 (03:51):
Around midnight on February eighth, nineteen eighty seven, Bud McFarland
swallowed roughly thirty volume tablets. When his wife woke up
the next morning, she saw that something was wrong and
called an ambulance.
Speaker 3 (04:03):
Missus McFarland was clutching a note from her husband, which
she refused to show to the medics.
Speaker 2 (04:08):
McFarlan has come under increasing strong as the Iran a
fair defense.
Speaker 4 (04:13):
McFarlane, who was forty nine years old, was taken to
a nearby naval hospital to recover. News of McFarland's suicide
attempt came as multiple investigations into Iran Contra were lurching
to life.
Speaker 6 (04:29):
The nation's one hundredth Congress convened today clearly preoccupied with
the Iran Contra crisis.
Speaker 4 (04:35):
The House and the Senate had both formed committees to
look into the matter, and they were preparing for public hearings.
Speaker 6 (04:40):
After a long debate, the Senate finally approved a resolution
authorizing a bipartisan committee to investigate.
Speaker 7 (04:46):
Adopted overwhelmingly bipartisanly by a margin of four hundred and.
Speaker 8 (04:50):
Sixteen to two.
Speaker 7 (04:51):
The House also established its Select Committee.
Speaker 4 (04:54):
While Congress set its inquiry in motion, prosecutors working in
the Office of the Independent Council were undertaking a separate investigation.
Speaker 8 (05:01):
Lawrence Walsh, a former judge and former Deputy Attorney General,
demand to search for any criminal wrongdoing.
Speaker 4 (05:07):
Unlike Congress, the Independent Council was pursuing a criminal probe
intended to identify any illegal acts that may have been
committed as part of Iran contract.
Speaker 7 (05:16):
I think that we have a statutory basis to believe
that a federal law may have been violated.
Speaker 4 (05:22):
And then there was the Tower Commission, a three person
panel appointed by the President that included a former national
security advisor and two former senators.
Speaker 6 (05:30):
Former Texas Senator John Tower, former National Security Advisor Brent Scolcroft,
and former Secretary of State Edmund Muski are.
Speaker 9 (05:37):
The other members.
Speaker 4 (05:38):
Their job was to find out what had gone wrong
in the White House and then share their findings with
the public. The Tower Commission was most focused on the
National Security Council.
Speaker 2 (05:47):
The panel reportably has expanded its investigation to include possible
attempts to cover up the scandal.
Speaker 4 (05:54):
Looking back, it's no surprise McFarland's foreign policy memo didn't
get more attention. Reagan was under siege and the notion
that he could just set the scandal aside and get
back to business was wishful thinking. As Congress prepared to
hold hearings, the American public wanted answers. What had the
President known about Iran Contra, when did he know it?
(06:18):
And had he lied to cover it up. I'm Leon
Nafok from Prolog Projects and Pushkin Industries. This is fiasco
Iran contract.
Speaker 8 (06:27):
The full story of the Iran Contra affair begins to
unfold for all of us to see.
Speaker 10 (06:33):
Colonel lath please rise.
Speaker 3 (06:34):
Oliver North has become the hottest tickets in town.
Speaker 7 (06:37):
The man's become an instant celebrity.
Speaker 2 (06:39):
I mispled the Congress secrecy, deception, and disdain for the law.
Speaker 11 (06:44):
We were shocked. To this day, I'm shocked.
Speaker 12 (06:47):
Millions of Americans have a nagging suspicion that the truth
has not yet come out.
Speaker 4 (06:54):
Episode six fault Lines, The Iran Contra goes on trial
as each of its principal architects takes a turn fielding
the blame. We'll be right back, Bud. McFarlane ended up
(07:16):
spending about two weeks in the hospital. During his recovery,
he received several notable visits. One was from former President
Richard Nixon, who gave McFarland advice on overcoming adversity and
living with one's mistakes. McFarland was also visited by the
three members of the Tower Commission, who interviewed him in
his hospital room for more than six hours. They were
(07:39):
particularly interested in whether Reagan had pre approved the very
first arm sales to Iran. McFarlane told them he had.
Just a few days later, the Tower Commission released its
report on Iran Contra, It was more than three hundred
pages long, and its conclusions were not flattering to the president.
Speaker 13 (07:59):
The Special Review Board has completed its work, but it
might be helpful to give you the highlights of this
rather lengthy report to the president.
Speaker 4 (08:08):
At a press conference, the commission's chairman and namesake, John
Tower detailed the president's failings as a manager. Though most
of the bad ideas had come from Reagan's subordinates, Tower
said it was his job to watch what they were
doing and rain them in.
Speaker 13 (08:22):
Now you can say that perhaps this president holds himself
a little bit too aloof from the implementation of policy.
But one thing is very very clear that members of
the system who were privied of what was going on
failed to the president because the president clearly didn't understand.
Speaker 2 (08:40):
And the President of the United States is described here
generally as a man who just simply was not very
much in control of the foreign policy apparatus of his administration.
Speaker 4 (08:49):
The Tower report would not be the final verdict underran contract.
There were still congressional hearings ahead, as well as potential
indictments coming out of the Independent Council's Office, but for
the time being, the report spoke loudly here was a
panel created by the President, and the best thing they
could say about him was that he was out to lunch.
Speaker 3 (09:13):
This is an NBCU special President Reagan's response to the
Tower Commission report. I.
Speaker 14 (09:22):
Fellow Americans, I've spoken to you from this historic office
on many occasions and about many things.
Speaker 4 (09:27):
On March fourth, nineteen eighty seven, Reagan delivered a primetime
speech in response to the Tower Board's findings.
Speaker 14 (09:34):
For the past three months, I've been silent on the
revelations about Iran, and you must have been thinking of
why doesn't he tell us what's happening. But I've had
to wait, as you have, for the complete story.
Speaker 4 (09:46):
Reagan called the Tower report honest, convincing, and highly critical.
Then he referred back to his first public statements about
the scandal, it admitted that they had been inaccurate.
Speaker 14 (09:57):
A few months ago, I told the American people, I
did not trade arms for hostages. My heart and my
best intentions still tell me that's true. But the facts
and the evidence tell me it is. Not reasons why
it happened, but no excuses. It was a mistake.
Speaker 4 (10:15):
But the time for candid self reflection had passed. As
much as Reagan may have wanted to move on from
Iran Contra. The scrutiny was only going to intensify as
Congress prepared for televised hearings.
Speaker 5 (10:27):
The public and the press wanted to know what the
hell happened, how high it went, who was responsible for it,
and was there anything that we didn't know.
Speaker 4 (10:36):
This is John Neilds. He's a former prosecutor who was
hired by House Democrats as chief counsel to lead their
investigation and question witnesses during the hearings.
Speaker 5 (10:46):
Our job was to tell the story in a way
that people could figure out for themselves what things were wrong,
what things were arguably wrong and arguably right, and what
things were fine.
Speaker 4 (10:58):
It's important to note that these were not impeachment hearings.
Neilds was convinced it was highly unlikely that Congress would
ever take that step. Reagan was too popular and his
second term was almost up anyway. Also, Neilds thought it
was pretty clear that whatever Reagan did, his intentions had
not been malevolent. There was one circumstance in which Congress
(11:21):
might consider impeachment. According to Neilds, the ranking Republican on
the committee, Warren Rudman, took the view that impeachment would
only be appropriate if Reagan had personally authorized the diversion.
Speaker 5 (11:33):
He made it the only issue on which Reagan could
be impeached. He really wanted to find out as soon
as possible the facts that, in his mind would answer
the question, is anything impeachable happened here?
Speaker 2 (11:46):
And this survey finds that public skepticism is now very deep,
and forty one percent think that President Reagan should resign
if it turns out he knew that money was being
diverted to the Nicaraguan contras.
Speaker 4 (11:59):
But as Neil saw it, the diversion, the hyphen at
the center of Iran contra was only a shiny object,
a diversion, you might say, from everything else that was
wrong with the Iran weapons program and the country war individually.
Speaker 5 (12:12):
Knowing whether the president was responsible for the diversion was
probably the most exciting question that we had to deal with.
I don't think it has an awful lot to do
with answering the question of whether this was a shocking
and really serious a breakdown in the way our government functioned.
(12:37):
That's what I thought this was about.
Speaker 12 (12:39):
Millions of Americans have a nagging suspicion that the truth
has not yet come out.
Speaker 15 (12:46):
Three branches must be involved in the governing of the
people of this country, and when one branch goes all
wild without even including consultation with the other branches, that
spells trouble.
Speaker 4 (13:07):
It's hard to overstate how huge an undertake these hearings were.
Before Congress could publicly question a single witness, Meals and
his team of investigators had to obtain documents, take depositions,
and figure out which leads to pursue. That meant probing
multiple government agencies, including the National Security Council, the State Department,
(13:27):
the Pentagon, the Justice Department, and the White House itself.
Then there was the international angle. The Nicaraguin thread alone
involved members of the Contras who were based in Honduras
and Costa Rica. On the Iran side of things, the
investigators would have to make contact with Middle Eastern arms
dealers and Israeli diplomats. It was hard to say where
the trail would take them, but even in the simplest scenario,
(13:51):
Meals and his colleagues were going to have to trace
millions of dollars moving through a maze of Swiss bank accounts,
shell companies, and foreign countries.
Speaker 3 (13:58):
The Senate, so like Comeree voted today to order General
Richard Seacourt to disclose records of Swiss bank accounts he holds.
Speaker 1 (14:04):
See what happened to the money, who set the accounts up,
who had access to the accounts, how much more when
it was in the accounts, and where do the money
go now?
Speaker 5 (14:12):
This was a set of issues that if I had
been in an assistant US attorney, as I had been
previously in my life, I would have looked at this
as a one or two year investigation before you could
say you've done your job. And it was very clear
that we were only going to have a matter of months.
Speaker 4 (14:33):
The time crunch was the result of a compromise between
Democratic and Republican leaders in Congress. As you might imagine,
Republicans wanted to get the hearings over and done with
as quickly as possible, while Democrats argued for letting them
go on as long as they needed to. Hanging over
this procedural debate was the upcoming presidential election, in which
(14:54):
Ronald Reagan's vice President, George H. W. Bush was expected
to run. In the end, it was decided that Congress
would have until August to get through the hearings. Here
is Pam Nonton, who worked on the House investigation with
John Nields.
Speaker 11 (15:09):
It did make more difficult because when you put an
end date on the investigation before you've even begun it,
how in the world do you know how long it
will take. It may take less than that, may take
more than that. You go where the evidence leads, you
don't just stop.
Speaker 4 (15:25):
The team divided the case up into silos and assigned
investigators to each one. Notton, for instance, was put on
the Department of Justice, which meant she was looking into
the weekend fact finding mission you heard about in our
previous episode.
Speaker 11 (15:37):
I mean, obviously I was there to investigate what the
Attorney General did when this first broke his quote unquote
investigation to you know, get their quote get their arms
around the facts, but also the broader issue of what
did the Department of Justice know about the arms sale?
(16:00):
So it was sort of a wide swath of things
because it involved different divisions of the department.
Speaker 4 (16:09):
The clock ticked, Nilds and his team encountered an obstacle
that was no less daunting than their deadline. Their two
would be star witnesses, Oliver North and his supervisor John
Poindexter were going to plead the Fifth North and Poindexter
would refuse to testify at the hearings unless Congress gave
them immunity. That meant guaranteeing that North and Poindexter's words
(16:32):
would not be used against them in a criminal inquiry.
The situation put Neilds and his team on a collision
course with the other big Iran contraprobe in Town, the
Independent Council, Lawrence Walsh.
Speaker 7 (16:44):
In a strongly worded letter accompanied by a legal memo,
Walsh urges the House Committee not to grant witnesses immunity
until after his work is done. To do so, he writes,
would quote create serious and perhaps insurmountable barriers to the
prosecution of the witnesses.
Speaker 4 (16:59):
Walsh's mandate was to identify any criminal wrongdoing that may
have occurred as part of Iran Contra. That was why
North and Poindexter wanted immunity. If they could get it,
nothing they said to Congress could be used against them
in an indictment.
Speaker 7 (17:13):
And that the prosecution would have to prove its case
was based on other information.
Speaker 4 (17:17):
As a former prosecutor, John Neilds understood how much harder
that would make it for Walsh to build cases, but
in the end he supported the grant of immunity.
Speaker 5 (17:27):
I felt conflicted. I knew that something good was going
to come out of it, which was what I thought
was the more important good, which is the public is
going to learn everything.
Speaker 2 (17:37):
The Congressional committee's investigating the scandal formally approved a plan
for a limited immunity for these two men, John Poindexter
and Oliver.
Speaker 8 (17:44):
North, and here on Capitol Hill today, after months of expectation,
the full story of the Iran Contra affair begins to
unfold for all of us to see.
Speaker 4 (18:00):
The Iran contray hearings opened on May fifth, nineteen eighty seven,
a little more than six months after the scandal broke.
They were run by a joint committee, meaning the House
and the Senate were combining their investigations so that witnesses
wouldn't have to testify twice.
Speaker 10 (18:16):
The joint hearings of the House Select Committee to Investigate
Covert Arms Transaction with Iran and the Senate Select Committee
on Secret Military Assistance to Iran and the Nicaraguan Opposition
will come to order.
Speaker 4 (18:30):
The first witness would be retired Major General Richard Seacord,
who had overseen logistics for both the Contra war and
the Iran weapons program.
Speaker 8 (18:38):
A key figure who has not been heard from before,
began to tell the committees of his own involvement in
sending arms to Iran and in helping the countries in
Central Americas.
Speaker 4 (18:48):
Seacord did not demand immunity in exchange for his testimony.
He insisted that his involvement was that of a private
citizen and a businessman. He told the committee about how
his operation had worked and said he thought he was
just carrying out the president's policy.
Speaker 16 (19:03):
The president has certain rights in the foreign policy area.
I never saw myself as being foreign policy operative.
Speaker 12 (19:13):
You saw nothing wrong with this operation.
Speaker 16 (19:15):
I did not see anything wrong with it.
Speaker 4 (19:17):
Then, Seacord seemed sensitive to suggestions that he had only
gotten involved in ron Contra to make money.
Speaker 16 (19:23):
There was no intention of profiteerian. I know that some
people were tossing this word around right now, and I
resent it.
Speaker 3 (19:33):
If Seacord wasn't doing all this for profit, why wouldn't
he turnover records of his Swiss bank accounts.
Speaker 16 (19:38):
I relied on the advice of my accounsel. Let's get
off the subject.
Speaker 17 (19:42):
You're making the rulings.
Speaker 16 (19:44):
No, sir, but I did not come here.
Speaker 18 (19:46):
To be badger.
Speaker 4 (19:51):
Seacord's testimony set the tone for the rest of the hearings.
Bud McFarland testified next.
Speaker 19 (19:56):
Our witness this morning is mister Robert Carl McFarlane, the
former National Security Advisor to the President.
Speaker 4 (20:04):
When McFarland was asked about Oliver North's destruction of documents,
the term shredding party was introduced into the national lexicon.
Speaker 17 (20:12):
Colonel North tell you when the car that there was
going to be a shredding party that weekend.
Speaker 1 (20:21):
Well, just that there had to be one, the attorney.
Speaker 4 (20:27):
By the end of May nineteen eighty seven, the Iran
contry hearings were becoming a national obsession. This is a
song from a late night Cinemax show called This Week
Indoors Document.
Speaker 13 (20:40):
Peoples Have Not.
Speaker 4 (20:43):
As the hearings continued, the witnesses just kept getting more exciting.
About a month then America met Oliver North's personal secretary,
Fawn Hall.
Speaker 8 (20:52):
She is twenty seven years old. She went to high
school in Virginia and then on to finishing school and
of course in modeling.
Speaker 4 (20:59):
Hall is blonde and striking. As it turned out, she
was a former model.
Speaker 3 (21:04):
Fawn Hall's appearance on Capitol Hill was a media event.
She was surrounded by cameras and security men.
Speaker 7 (21:10):
Paul read an opening statement, making as clear as she
could that despite her looks, she is not just a
pretty face.
Speaker 17 (21:16):
And perform my duties in exemplary manner.
Speaker 19 (21:19):
I can type.
Speaker 7 (21:20):
That last, of course, a reference to congressional sex scandals
involving secretaries who admitted they could not type.
Speaker 4 (21:26):
Hall's looks were not the only reason people were anticipating
her testimony. They also wanted to know about the so
called shredding party that she and North allegedly collaborated on
after the Iran scandal broke.
Speaker 2 (21:36):
Fawn Hall told how she altered and shredded key documents
a secretary to Lieutenant Colonel Oliver North at the White.
Speaker 20 (21:43):
House, and as he pulled documents from each dower and
placed on top of the shredder, I inserted them into
the shredder.
Speaker 4 (21:51):
Hall also testified to sneaking documents out of North's office
by stuffing them in her clothes.
Speaker 16 (21:56):
And then you proceeded to remove documents from your boots
and from other parts of your clothing.
Speaker 17 (22:02):
Is that correct?
Speaker 11 (22:03):
That's correct?
Speaker 4 (22:04):
Her more than anything. Fawn Hall's testimony was about defending
Oliver North. He portrayed the colonel as a patriot, a
hard working idealist whose only goal was to protect the
United States. According to Hall, everything North did, including the
destruction of documents, was done in the name of American interests.
Speaker 17 (22:24):
And did you.
Speaker 13 (22:26):
Surmise that this was a way of trying to cover
up something in conjunction with the Iran initiative or the
Contra initiative.
Speaker 11 (22:34):
I do not use the word cover up. I would
use the word protect.
Speaker 4 (22:40):
Vawn Hall wasn't the only witness to go to bat
for North. One of the Contra leaders flew in to
testify as well. And even though most of what he
had to say implicated North in Contra activities, what stuck
out was the ardor with which he defended North's character
and dedication to the anti communist cause.
Speaker 17 (22:57):
I have and still have high respect for Colonel North.
But there was a group saying that they were going
to erect a monument for Colonel North once that Mikaraua
was liberated.
Speaker 9 (23:08):
Would it be possible to make a brief quote statement,
And I will ask before I read it. It's a
poem that.
Speaker 4 (23:13):
Then North assistant Robert Owen ended his closing statement by
reading a poem.
Speaker 9 (23:18):
Ali, your enemies are more clever and more treacherous than ours.
Yet you have given all you had to give. We
have so very little to give you in return. Yet
we want you to know that in our hearts and
our prayers, you're with us daily. You're giving our children
a chance to live as free individuals. And for these
things we say thank you, Oli North. And I can
only add that I love Oli North like a brother,
(23:41):
and I want to thank the committee.
Speaker 4 (23:42):
For all this fanfare around Oliver North, who had been
refusing to testify, built anticipation for the moment when the
man himself would finally appear before the committee and give
his side of the story.
Speaker 3 (23:53):
Oliver North, after months of delaying and stonewalling, finally goes
before Congress tomorrow.
Speaker 15 (23:58):
Ifty nine percent of those surveyed thank North will lie
to Congressional committees investigating the scandal when he begins testifying Tuesday.
Speaker 4 (24:05):
The summer of Iran Contra war on North had everyone's
attention a lot.
Speaker 6 (24:10):
In the history of Congress have so many lawmakers been
so interested in what our lieutenant colonel in the Marine
Corps has to say, well, the swashbuckling marine who once
declared without complaint that.
Speaker 3 (24:20):
He was ready to be the pall guy d day
is at hand.
Speaker 10 (24:30):
The hurrying will please come to order.
Speaker 4 (24:32):
On the morning of July seventh, nineteen eighty seven, Oliver
North sat before the Congressional Committee waiting for his testimony
to begin. He wore his marine uniform, proudly displaying the
ribbons and medals he had earned in Vietnam, including two
purple hearts and a silver Star North Saltan Pepper hare
was neatly parted, and he sat straight up with his
(24:52):
jaw squared.
Speaker 20 (24:53):
Colonel Law, please rise.
Speaker 4 (24:55):
He looked young and almost indecently handsome. Here's Pam Nawton again.
Speaker 11 (25:00):
When he took the oa with all the cameras started snapping,
as like a whole flock of birds of descended upon
the room.
Speaker 10 (25:10):
Do you solemnly where that in the testimony you're about
to give will be the proof the whole pooth and nothing.
Speaker 4 (25:19):
Remember, North's testimony was being shown live on television, and
Noughton believes that the camera angles affected the way he
was perceived.
Speaker 11 (25:27):
They had placed a third camera on the floor so
that you could sort of see him sitting over the camera,
and it made him much larger than he was in person.
He's a rather slight man, but on TV, because of
the angle of the camera, he looked, you know, heroic
(25:48):
and huge and strong.
Speaker 4 (25:51):
John Neilds was first up to question North, and North
did not waste any time telegraphing his attitude about what
was going on.
Speaker 21 (25:58):
Colonel North, you were involved in two operations of this
government of great significance to the people of this country.
Speaker 9 (26:06):
Is that correct?
Speaker 21 (26:08):
At least two, yes, sir, And these operations were carried
out in.
Speaker 14 (26:15):
Secret, we hoped so.
Speaker 4 (26:19):
Neilds began with a line of questioning about why North
had felt it was proper to keep his activities secret
and to destroy evidence after the fact. North's response was
that he couldn't risk the possibility of America's adversaries getting
their hands on classified information. Neilds pressed him, But it.
Speaker 21 (26:35):
Was designed to be kept a secret from the American people.
Speaker 20 (26:39):
I think what is important, mister neild says, that we
somehow arrive at some kind of an understanding right here
and now as to what a covert operation is. I mean,
if we could find a way to insulate with a
bubble over these hearings that are being broadcast in Moscow
and talk about covert operations to the American people without
(27:02):
it getting into the hands of our adversaries. I'm sure
we would do that.
Speaker 4 (27:06):
Neilds was trying to make an argument that in retrospect
he feels like he didn't quite get a in the
heat of the moment.
Speaker 5 (27:12):
What the reason this was covert was not because we
were afraid our enemies would find out about it, was
we're afraid of the American people were going to find
out about it. Lots of it was unlawful, and that
he's going to wrap himself in God country and flag
as a justification for telling lies about stuff.
Speaker 4 (27:33):
The contrast between North and Neilds was almost cartoonish. North
looked like g I. Joe Well. Neilds was more like
a pencil necked, long haired graduate student, and though North
went out of his way to punctuate his comments with
polite formalities, the mutual hostility between the two men was obvious.
It didn't help that North's lawyer, Brendan Sullivan, was regularly
(27:55):
interrupting neils and raising objections.
Speaker 21 (27:57):
Objection, how many times do we have to have the
question answer, asked mister chairman.
Speaker 4 (28:01):
At one point, North and Sullivan seemed to be mocking
Neils from their table. Neilds was frustrated, Well.
Speaker 15 (28:08):
What is your question, council?
Speaker 21 (28:15):
Have you forgotten the question?
Speaker 19 (28:16):
All I have? And I have to make objections?
Speaker 22 (28:19):
So you ask it again?
Speaker 21 (28:20):
And you did, and it was overruled, and the question stands.
I'd like the witness to answer it if he remembers.
Speaker 20 (28:26):
It, could we He obviously doesn't remember it.
Speaker 13 (28:28):
He just asked you to repeat it.
Speaker 21 (28:29):
May yeah you did, he did not, Sir, do you
remember the question?
Speaker 20 (28:39):
My memory has been shredded, if you would be so
kind as to repeat the question.
Speaker 4 (28:44):
Pam Norton, the congressional investigator working under Neild's, was taken
aback by North's demeanor.
Speaker 11 (28:50):
I remember after about an hour or so, John Yild said, well,
we're going to take a break now, but when we
come back, I'm going to ask you about X Y Z,
and North said something the effective, Oh, I can hardly wait.
Speaker 21 (29:01):
When we get back, I am going to ask you
some questions relating to those transactions.
Speaker 20 (29:07):
That's a cliffhanger of an ending.
Speaker 4 (29:10):
When the committee took a short break, notting and some
of our colleagues whispered to each other about North's performance.
Speaker 11 (29:16):
We were saying to ourselves, behind the dice, boy, he's
really coming off like a jerk.
Speaker 4 (29:22):
But then an ABC News reporter named Britt Hume checked
in with the committee lawyers and set them straight.
Speaker 11 (29:28):
You know, we said, what do you think, and he goes,
I think he's a jerk, he said, but he's coming
off great on TV. We're getting flooded with calls. People
love him.
Speaker 4 (29:40):
At the same time, committee members were also getting a
sense of how well North was playing with the folks
watching at home.
Speaker 11 (29:46):
The members went back to their offices and were finding
that their switchboards were getting flooded with calls of people
who loved this handsome Lieutenant Kernel.
Speaker 3 (29:55):
With all of his medals, all of the North seems
to have much of the nation in the palm of
his hand.
Speaker 4 (30:02):
Over the course of his six days of testimony, North
developed a true fan base.
Speaker 23 (30:08):
Of those surveyed North as a patriot and hero, forty
eight percent believe North is being harassed by the congressional panels,
and twenty eight percent say they would enthusiastically support North
if he ran for public office.
Speaker 4 (30:23):
Journalists were happy to embrace the public affection for North,
evidently relieved to have a real leading man in the
Iran Contra crisis. The media took to calling him by
his nickname Ali, and before long everyone was talking about
Ali Mania.
Speaker 13 (30:38):
Movies, lectures, Millingham dollar, book contracts.
Speaker 7 (30:41):
The Washington Post ran a lengthy analysis of Colonel North's face.
Speaker 4 (30:44):
The three major news networks canceled regularly scheduled programming to
show north testimony. Gavel to Gavel, a bar maid near Boston,
had expected to dislike Colonel North.
Speaker 22 (30:54):
After watching the testimony, I began to dislike the committee
that was questioning him.
Speaker 18 (30:59):
I felt though they were conducting a witch hunt.
Speaker 11 (31:02):
His brush is in that uniform, the.
Speaker 6 (31:03):
Real hero, and I'm with you one hundred percent, And
I'm Glady of the American mine.
Speaker 20 (31:08):
And I'm proud of it.
Speaker 4 (31:11):
By the third day of North's testimony, thousands of telegrams
have been sent to the White House, very few of
them critical. Flowers for North arrived daily to the Senate
Office building.
Speaker 5 (31:23):
Oliver North has become the hottest tickets.
Speaker 9 (31:25):
In town or Oliver North's t shirts.
Speaker 17 (31:28):
There is talk of an Oliver North doll.
Speaker 4 (31:30):
Barber's offered Ali North style haircuts Oli for President merch
sprang up across the country.
Speaker 22 (31:35):
Ali Berger served up with shredded lettuce, shredded cheese, and
of course topped with an American flag.
Speaker 13 (31:42):
Let's place it lovely more Haitian.
Speaker 19 (31:44):
The man's become an instant celebrity.
Speaker 8 (31:46):
You think of another country where that had happened.
Speaker 4 (31:53):
John Nields, the long haired lawyer for the House Democrats,
remembers North's popularity rising at his expense.
Speaker 5 (31:59):
I found out that there were a significant portion of
the world that thought Ali North was a cool guy,
and that I wasn't a cool guy.
Speaker 4 (32:09):
But Neil's got the appeal and he understood the dynamic.
Speaker 5 (32:13):
This was Vietnam right. I don't know what it is now,
maybe it's immigration or something, but the left right thing
was Vietnam, and he was playing to the people who
felt dissed, their patriotism had been disrespected after Vietnam, and
that the country had abandoned them in the middle of
(32:35):
a war, and who left them to die and come
home as anything other than heroes. And I understand that
very well. I mean, I thought the Vietnam War was
a big, big mistake, and so if he was trying
to pitch me as one of those people. It would
(32:57):
be truthful.
Speaker 4 (32:58):
Pam Norton says, the deluge of calls and letters had
an immediate effect on the committee member's line of questioning.
Speaker 11 (33:05):
And that's when they basically stopped asking, you know, questions,
just the natural fear of a member. Whenever you put
a question in front of them, the member would say, well,
what's he going to say? Well, I don't know what
he's going to say. That's why it's an investigation. And
they wouldn't do it, not with the witness who had
that much public powerful sway.
Speaker 4 (33:26):
At that point, the softballs the North was getting from
the committee members stood in stark contrast to the grilling
he received from Neils.
Speaker 5 (33:34):
That's sort of the end of his questioning. I asked
him about lying to Congress.
Speaker 4 (33:40):
North was defiant.
Speaker 20 (33:41):
I think we can abbreviate this in hopes that we
can move on so that I can finish this week.
Speaker 5 (33:46):
But almost like proud of himself, I will tell you
right now, Council, and all the members here gathered.
Speaker 20 (33:53):
And all the members here gathered that.
Speaker 5 (33:56):
I misled the CONGRESSSS I.
Speaker 16 (33:59):
Missed at that meeting.
Speaker 21 (34:01):
At that meeting face to face, face to face.
Speaker 5 (34:04):
You made false statements to them about your activities in
support of the contries I did. I mean, it's who
he is and he was telling the truth then, so
that's again credit for that's good.
Speaker 4 (34:22):
One thing that was interesting about Oliver North's testimony was that,
as unapologetic as he was, he didn't exactly take the
blame for the scandal. In fact, he made it clear
over and over again that even though he stood by
everything he had done, he'd also just been following orders
like a good marine.
Speaker 20 (34:39):
I was simply a staff member with a demonstrated ability
to get the job done. I reported directly to mister
McFarland and to Admiral Poindexter. My authority to act always flowed,
I believe from my superiors. My military training inculcated in
me a strong belief in the chain of command, and
so far as I can recall, I always acted on
(35:01):
major matters with specific approval, after informing my superiors of
the facts as I knew them, the risks and the
potential benefits.
Speaker 4 (35:11):
This testimony fed into the big question coursing through the
Iran Contra hearings. How much had the President known specifically
what had he known about the diversion of funds from
the Iran operation to the contrace. The person best position
to answer this question was John Poindexter, Oliver North's boss
and the National Security advisor at the time of the
(35:32):
nineteen eighty six arm shipments.
Speaker 24 (35:34):
Sword says he had sent Poindexter five memos seeking President
Reagan's approval for the diversion. Nord says he doesn't know
if they reached the President. So committee members will ask Poindexter.
Speaker 4 (35:51):
We'll be right back.
Speaker 19 (35:59):
The committees meet this morning to hear the testimony of
Admiral John Poindexter. Admiral would you please rise to take
the oath?
Speaker 4 (36:08):
John Poindexter, who had resigned as Reagan's National Security advisor
over Iran contra, took the stand on July fifteenth, right
after North. Poindexter was more subdued than North, but came
across as similarly unrepentant, stating flatly that he had been
hoping to withhold information from Congress.
Speaker 18 (36:28):
It wasn't withholding it from the American people. It was
that there were a lot of opponents in the Congress
that would have not agreed with our interpretation of the
Bowld amendment, they wouldn't have agreed to the Iranian project,
and if it came out, it was going to be
(36:50):
a very hot political issue and it would be used
to pound on the president.
Speaker 4 (36:55):
Then it came time for Poindexter to answer the million
dollar question. Taking intermittent puffs on his pipe, he explained
that none of his superiors, including President Reagan, had been
aware of the diversion of Iran weapons profits to the Contras.
To drive the point home, Poindexter invoked Harry Truman's famous
line about accountability.
Speaker 18 (37:16):
I think it's, you know, an important point here is
on this whole issue. You know, the buck stops here
with me.
Speaker 5 (37:24):
I made the decision.
Speaker 18 (37:25):
I felt that I had the authority to do it.
I was convinced that the President would in the end
think it was a good idea, but I did not
want him to be associated with the decision.
Speaker 4 (37:41):
John Neilds told me he still thinks about Poindexter's answer,
and he still doesn't know what to make of it.
On the one hand, Poindexter was testifying plainly that he
did not tell Reagan about the diversion. On the other hand,
he was admitting that his goal had been to give
the president deniability.
Speaker 5 (37:59):
He was telling them my role in life, according to
my lights, is to take the blame so that the
president doesn't have to And there could be two ways
of doing that. One not tell the president and not
tell the truth. Here, those are the two different ways. Well,
(38:21):
it goes without saying I have no idea whether he
told the truth or not. And I think that's what
everybody thought, what that they didn't know whether Poindexter told
the truth.
Speaker 4 (38:36):
After Poindexter's testimony, the three news networks began rotating coverage
of the hearings and resumed their regularly scheduled programming. By
eliminating the possibility that Reagan would be personally linked to
the diversion, Poindexter had effectively closed the case and take
an impeachment off the table.
Speaker 7 (38:54):
The scandal is largely over.
Speaker 3 (38:56):
Some committee members say this is a suspense novel which
has lost a suspense. That may be one reason the
committee now hopes to wrap up its work a week
early by the end of July.
Speaker 4 (39:07):
Pam Nawton remembers thinking about how differently all Over North
and John Poindexter had approached the issue of responsibility. Poindexter
had at least made a show of owning the diversion. North,
on the other hand, had emphasized his status as a
low level operative carrying out a mission handed to him
from on high.
Speaker 11 (39:25):
To this day, I'm shocked because he is still viewed
in many segments of the right as this hero this
heroic guy. The truth of the matter is, he took
the Fifth Amendment. He only testified with the grant of
immunity with a deal. And if you listen to his testimony,
(39:47):
he pointed the finger upward. He said he believed the
President of the United States knew what he was doing.
He was a snitch essentially in common parlance. And it
was Poindexter, his boss, that took the bullet. It's Poindexter
who came in a regular street suit, not an admiral uniform,
(40:12):
and basically said, the buck stops here. I didn't discuss
it with the President. I take the bullet.
Speaker 4 (40:29):
After the hearings ended, the Congressional Committee wrote up their
findings and published them that November in a six hundred
and ninety page report.
Speaker 2 (40:37):
Good Morning, the Joint House and Senate committees which investigated
the Iran Contra affair today issue their majority report, a
six hundred and ninety page document that does not produce
a smoking god.
Speaker 4 (40:49):
And the committee's conclusions were quite different than the Tower
Commission's report released earlier in the year.
Speaker 6 (40:54):
It was, in the opinion of the majority who signed
this report the President who had set the tone allowing
a cabal of Zealotz to seize control.
Speaker 19 (41:02):
The common ingredients in the Iran Contra affair were secrecy, deception,
and a disdain for law.
Speaker 4 (41:10):
The report was particularly critical of the White House's and
runs around Congress.
Speaker 10 (41:14):
They conducted a secret foreign policy and concealed it through
a concerted campaign of dishonesty and deception, and when the
affair began to unravel, they attempted to cover up their deeds.
Speaker 4 (41:27):
But a group of eight Republicans who had served in
the committee refused to sign on to the verdict.
Speaker 6 (41:32):
Included in the final report is a minority section which
accuses the committees of reaching hysterical conclusions.
Speaker 7 (41:39):
It started out as a witch hunt, it proceeded as
a witch hunt, and the final report indicates that indeed
it was a witch.
Speaker 4 (41:47):
Hunt led by a Wyoming Congressman named Dick Cheney. The
Republican dissenters published their own report, making the case not
only for Reagan's innocence, but for the innocence of his
entire administration. They said there was no systematic disrespect for
the rule of law, no grand conspiracy, and no administration
wide dishonesty or cover up. In their opinion, the majority's
(42:10):
conclusions were hysterical.
Speaker 22 (42:12):
I think what the president was guildia was making an
unwise decisions, such as sending arms to Iran. But I
think he had the legal authority to do that. I
think he had the legal authority to withhold notification from Congress.
I don't think those decisions were always why.
Speaker 4 (42:24):
Cheney and the other seven Republicans argued that the real
fault for Iran contra lay with the congressman who had
pushed for the restrictions on contra funding. It was a
robust defense of executive authority won that Dick Cheney would
later echo as Vice President. By the time Congress wrapped
(42:45):
up its work, there was one politician besides Ronald Reagan
who remained unscathed. George H. W. Bush had been director
of the CIA before becoming Vice president. He had set
in on many high level meetings involving national security during
the Reagan years, but The committee report was inconclusive on
what Bush knew about Iran Contra.
Speaker 6 (43:05):
The committees concluded that there is no evidence that Vice
President Bush knew about the diversion.
Speaker 4 (43:11):
In the fall of nineteen eighty seven, when the report
was released, Bush was on to bigger and better things.
I am here today to announce my candidacy for President
of the United States. When asked about Iran Contra in interviews,
Bush insisted that he had been out of the loop. However,
(43:33):
Bush told The Washington Post if he were ever to
find himself in Ronald Reagan's position, he would expect his
staff to give him the facts. I wouldn't want somebody,
he said, to protect me from myself. On the next
(43:54):
episode of Fiasco, Iran Contra goes to Hollywood.
Speaker 1 (43:58):
Ali, you can't lie to your own people.
Speaker 12 (44:00):
It's not a lie.
Speaker 14 (44:01):
It's a Cocord operation. Hostage lives depend on what we
do here Eric.
Speaker 4 (44:07):
For a list of books, articles, and documentaries used in
our research, follow the link in the show notes. Fiasco
is a production of Prolog Projects, and it's distributed by
Pushkin Industries. Shows produced by Andrew Parsons, madelin kaplan Ula, Kulpa,
and me Leon Mayfock. Our editor was Camilla Hammer. Our
researcher was Francis Carr. Additional archival research from Caitlin Nicholas.
(44:31):
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 Rayphield
and Johnny Vince Evans. Copyright council provided by Peter Yassi
at Yassi Butler Plc. Thanks to Lee Hamilton, Amy Freed,
Brendan Sullivan, Melissa Kaplan, Harold Coe, as well as Sam
(44:54):
gram Felsen, Sireya Shackley and Katya Kumkova. Special thanks to
Luminary and thank you for listening. Binge the entire season
(45:17):
of Fiasco Iran Contra ad free by subscribing to Pushkin Plus.
Sign up on the Fiasco show page on Apple Podcasts
or at pushkin dot Fm slash Plus. Pushkin Plus subscribers
can access ad free episodes, full audiobooks, exclusive binges, and
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