McCain link to Iran-Contra?

[dennilfloss]

http://cnews.canoe.ca/CNEWS/US.../10/07/7011061-ap.html

Might be nothing but this will be worth watching just in case. Would Oliver North qualify as a crony?:laugh:

 

[nageov3t]

Originally posted by: dennilfloss

This is nothing

fixed

 

[Drakkon]

That was during the 80's and don't ya know that everything during the 80's is that which shall not be mentioned in this campaign?

 

[Fern]

I don't see this legitimately going anywhere.

At least not for people who know what "advisory board" means.

McCain was only on the advisory board from what I can see in the article. Advisory board members aren't officers, can't vote, and have no responsibility etc. They are nothing like a regular "Board of Directors".

Fern

 

[dennilfloss]

Originally posted by: Drakkon
That was during the 80's and don't ya know that everything during the 80's is that which shall not be mentioned in this campaign?

That rule does not seem to include Ronnie Raygun from what I've seen so far from McCain...

 

[Harvey]

Originally posted by: dennilfloss

Might be nothing but this will be worth watching just in case.

There's not enough info to know if there's anything to the association, but it's very much worth watching. If you don't know what the Iran-Contra scandal was about or Singlaub's involvement in it, do some homework before going into denial mode.

Would Oliver North qualify as a crony?:laugh:

Ollie North definitely qualifies as a traitor and a terrorist. Again, do your homework before going into denial mode.

 

[dennilfloss]

Uh? I am not in denial mode...

 

[Moonbeam]

But what do we really know about Sarah Plain? What if she's ruining for Alaskan independence from the US like her husband is. Do we need another civil war?

 

[sandorski]

Originally posted by: Moonbeam
But what do we really know about Sarah Plain? What if she's ruining for Alaskan independence from the US like her husband is. Do we need another civil war?

Careful. One shout for help from Palins front door will have Putin showing up quick.

 

[Harvey]

Originally posted by: dennilfloss

Uh? I am not in denial mode...

I wasn't talking about you. I was talking about those whose instinctive reaction is to deny the possibitly of the connection.

Remember, I'm old enough to remember the Iran-Contra scandal the first time around. I know Ollie North is a traitor who really did get away with his crimes on a procedural technicality.

Iran-Contra affair

The Iran-Contra affair affair was a political scandal which was revealed in November 1986 as a result of earlier events during the Reagan administration. It began as an operation to increase U.S.-Iranian relations, wherein Israel would ship weapons to a moderate, politically influential group of Iranians opposed to the Ayatollah Khomeini; the U.S. would reimburse Israel for those weapons and receive payment from Israel. The moderate Iranians agreed to do everything in their power to achieve the release of six U.S. hostages, who were being held by Hezbollah. The plan eventually deteriorated into an arms-for-hostages scheme, in which members of the executive branch sold weapons to Iran in exchange for the release of the American hostages, without the direct authorization of President Ronald Reagan. Large modifications to the plan were conjured by Lieutenant Colonel Oliver North of the National Security Council in late 1985. In North's plan, a portion of the proceeds from the weapon sales was diverted to fund anti-Sandinista and anti-communist rebels, or Contras, in Nicaragua. While President Ronald Reagan was a supporter of the Contra cause, there has not been any evidence uncovered showing that he authorized this plan.

After the weapon sales were revealed in November 1986, Ronald Reagan appeared on national television and stated that the weapons transfers had indeed occurred, but that the United States did not trade arms for hostages. The investigation was compounded when large volumes of documents relating to the scandal were destroyed or withheld from investigators by Reagan administration officials. On March 4, 1987, Reagan returned to the airwaves in a nationally televised address, taking full responsibility for any actions that he was unaware of, and admitting that "what began as a strategic opening to Iran deteriorated, in its implementation, into trading arms for hostages."

Among Olllie North's crimes is that he was one of those destroyed evidence of the crimes commited by him and other Reagan administration officials.

North sent money from the arms sale to the Nicaraguan Contras, also illegal, and since it was a shame to dead head an empty plane back from Central America, there is serious evidence North used the return trips to smuggle cocaine and marijuana into the U.S.

Oliver North
.
.
Involvement with drug trafficking

During the early and mid 1980s, Lt. Colonel North was alleged to participate in organizing the transportation of cocaine and marijuana from the various sites in Central and South America into the United States as a means of funding the Contra rebels. Congressional records show North was tasked with finding funding ?outside the CIA? after the Boland Amendment cut off funding for the Contras in October, 1984. Declassified interviews taken during Independent Counsel Lawrence Walsh's investigation into Iran-Contra, as well as North?s handwritten journal entries, detail an extensive operation involving civilian and military personnel from the U.S. and various Central American countries.

On February 10, 1986, Robert Owen, North?s liaison with the Contras, wrote North regarding a plane being used to carry "humanitarian aid" to the Contras that was previously used to transport drugs. The plane belonged to the Miami-based company Vortex, which is run by Michael Palmer, one of the largest marijuana traffickers in the United States. Despite Palmer's long history of drug smuggling, Palmer receives over $300,000 from the Nicaraguan Humanitarian Aid Office (NHAO) -- an office overseen by Oliver North, Assistant Secretary of State for Inter-American Affairs Elliott Abrams, and CIA officer Alan Fiers -- to ferry supplies to the Contras.

North?s own handwritten journals provide valuable insight into the mechanics of the operation as well. In his journal entry for August 9, 1985, North summarizes a meeting with Owen. They discuss a plane used to transport supplies from New Orleans to Contras in Honduras. North writes: "Honduran DC-6 which is being used for runs out of New Orleans is probably being used for drug runs into U.S."[11]

Other entries in the North Notebooks which specifically mention narcotics are:

• July 9, 1984. Call from Claridge-Call Michel re Narco Issue-RIG T 1000 Tomorrow *(QO384)-DEA Miami-Pilot went talked to Vaughn-wanted A/C (Adolfo Calero) to go *to Bolivia to p/u paste-want A/C to p/u 1500 kilos-Bud to meet w/Group (QO385)
  
• July 17, 1984. Call to Frank M-Bud Mullins Re-leak on DEA piece-Carlton Turner *(QO418) Call from-McManus, LA Times says/NSC source claims W.H. has pictures of *Borge loading cocaine in Nic. (QO416)
  
• Jan. 14, 1985. $14 million to finance came from drugs (Q1039)

If you want to talk about which Presidential candidate is associating with terrorists, radicals and criminals, Ollie North is a strong supporter of John McCain.

 

[deftron]

Anyone remember that 80's scandal?

• US covert operation sells weapons to Iran in exhange for prisoners
  US uses money to fund anti-communist "Contra" rebels in Nicauragua
  US further funds the Contra rebels through drug trafficking, importing coccaine
  into the US, leading to the crack coccaine explosion of the 80s and establishing the
  long term network of Central American - US drug trafficking, by developing the underground supply system.

Former CIA agent David MacMichael explained the inherent relationship between CIA activity in Latin America and drug trafficking: "Once you set up a covert operation to supply arms and money, it's very difficult to separate it from the kind of people who are involved in other forms of trade, and especially drugs. There is a limited number of planes, pilots and landing strips. By developing a system for supply of the Contras, the US built a road for drug supply into the US

On April 17, 1986, the Reagan Administration released a three page report acknowledging that there were some Contra-cocaine connections in 1984 and 1985

In 1986, Senator John Kerry and Senator Christopher Dodd proposed a series of hearings at the Senate Foreign Relations Committee regarding charges of Contra involvement in drug trafficking; the hearings were conducted by Senator Richard G. Lugar of Indiana, the Republican Chairman of the Committee. The report of the Committee, released on April 13, 1989, found that "Contra drug links included... payments to drug traffickers by the U.S. State Department of funds authorized by the Congress for humanitarian assistance to the Contras, in some cases after the traffickers had been indicted by federal law enforcement agencies on drug charges, in others while traffickers were under active investigation by these same agencies." The U.S. State Department paid over $806,000 to known drug traffickers to carry humanitarian assistance to the Contras

Former DEA agent Celerino Castillo alleged that during the 1980s Ilopango Airport in El Salvador was used by Contras for drug smuggling flights with the knowledge and complicity of the CIA. These allegations were part of an investigation by the United States Department of Justice Office of the Inspector General.[9] Castillo also testified before the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence. Between 1996 and 1998 the Central Intelligence Agency investigated and then published a report about its alleged involvement in cocaine sales in the US. This was prompted by the journalist Gary Webb's report in the Mercury News which alleged that the CIA was behind the 1980s crack epidemic.


Republican Sen. John McCain served on the advisory board to the U.S. chapter of an international group linked to ultra-right-wing death squads in Central America in the 1980s.
The U.S. Council for World Freedom also aided rebels trying to overthrow the leftist government of Nicaragua. That landed the group in the middle of the Iran-Contra affair and in legal trouble with the Internal Revenue Service, which revoked the charitable organization's tax exemption.
The council created by retired Army Maj. Gen. John Singlaub was the U.S. chapter of the World Anti-Communist League, an international organization linked to former Nazi collaborators and ultra-right-wing death squads in Central America.


Covert arms trades, "death squads" = terrorism?
Destroying a section of the US population to achieve political results = domestic terrorism?
I don't know, you tell me