The Contra Affair Of The Reagan Administration

Before the summer of 1972, the word “Watergate” meant nothing more than an office and luxurious apartment complex in Washington, D.C. A curious crime, two young reporters, and a secret source known as “Deep Throat”

The election of 1980 marked a ‘new political era’ that was ushered in by President Reagan and that followed on through the presidencies of George H. W. Bush and William Jefferson Clinton. These presidents were inaugurated at different times and succeeded the successes and the failures of their predecessors. Having came from different political backgrounds and having unique political and social beliefs, Bush, Reagan, and Clinton can only be analyzed through their foreign policies, domestic policies, achievements as well as shortcomings, and legacies.

In the years leading up to 1971, America saw the rise of a new president, Richard Nixon elected in 1968, who would ultimately become one of the most infamous men in American history. This was coupled with the rising resistance against the Vietnam War, resistances like the Kent State shooting in 1970 and the 1967 march to the pentagon. Overall, this was a pivotal time in wartime America to keep moral high among citizen in order for the government to have the support to finish out the war in Vietnam. However, Nixon was soon faced with a leak inside the government that captivated the nation. In 1971, the Pentagon Papers were published in the New York Times. The Pentagon Papers were a classified study by the United States Government officially

The Iran Contra affair is historically defined as the “Reagan administration scandal that involved the sale of arms to Iran in exchange for its efforts to secure the release of hostages in Lebanon and the redirection of the proceeds of those sales to the Nicaraguan Contras.” As the Nicaraguan counterrevolutionaries, known as the Contras, began their efforts to retaliate against the Socialist Sandinista Regime, American government forces stepped in to support the Contra cause in a hope to support the world-wide elimination of Communism. To understand the entire history of the scandal, many individuals, groups, policies, and deals must be researched and put together to tell the complete history of the Iran Contra affair.

"I think everyone knew we were walking a very thin line."(Owen) Not many Americans know the truth that lies behind the Iran-Contra scandals. Most would be surprised to know about the deception of our leaders. Still today, some truth of Iran-Contra lies hidden in the conscience of the people who organized it, aided it, and went through with it. It started with good intentions, but soon was corrupted. Some may argue that we must do what we can to smother the flame of communism, but I believe that deception, abuse of power and bloodshed is no way to go about it.

When we were first assigned to read select pages from Flawed Giant: Lyndon Johnson and his Times, as well as Reagan, the Life, I believed that I had a solid foundation in the history of these two men and their presidencies. I did not expect to learn a whole lot more about these presidents. However, throughout the reading of the two biographies, I found myself discovering more and more about these men, their personal lives, their accomplishments, and much more I never knew about them. These biographies, Reagan’s written by H. W. Brands and LBJ’s written by Robert Dallek, dive deep into each president’s backgrounds, and into their years in office. Each of these presidents was faced with matters of national and global concern during their

To begin, Congress, by fair vote, decided in the 1980s that the United States should not assist the contras fighting the socialist Sandinista government of Nicaragua (Corn 2006). Yet, the Reagan White House concocted several imaginative ways to pull an end-run around democracy (Corn 2006). Reagan’s decisions such as selling weapons to Iran were made with the knowledge that he would not suffer a decline in presidential approval. Thus, Reagan took various steps that were violations of law that not only involved himself, but members of the CIA. By 1986, two big revelations happened that caused this scandal to abrupt publically. The first was the shoot-down of a cargo plane over Nicaragua and the admission by the sole survivor that the plane had been delivering arms to the Contras against congressional restrictions (Kornbluh 2011). The second, revelation was the news story of Lebanon that stated

John Kerry conducted an investigation into the Iran Contra Scandal, in which he assigned members of his Senate staff to investigate the allegations made against Reagan. In addition, he influenced the Republican majority on the senate foreign relations committee to demand information from Reagans and Bush administration about the alleged Contra drug traffickers (Parry, 2004). John Kerry challenged Ronald Reagan at the peak of his power and Reagan did everything in his power to interfere with Kerry’s investigation. Some of Ronald’s actions included trying to discredit witnesses, stop the senate when Kerry requested evidence, and lastly, assigning the CIA to monitor Kerry’s Investigation. However, none of these tactics were enough to stop Kerry and his committee from finding out the truth about the cocaine scandal. What Kerry and his committee found was that the Contra

Where he was later accused of condoning a radical leader identified as Rios Montt and death units affiliated with the Salvadoran military that was subsidized by the U.S. government. But with those accusations, Reagan put a lot of energy into overthrowing the government in Nicaragua that almost ended Reagan's presidency. Thus resulting in the U.S. Senate cutting Reagan's ties to his surrogate army in Central America. Which this ended with The White House running the war from the basement of The White House and funded the operation by paying for some of it with prohibited arms sales to Iran that triggered the Iran-Contra Affair. These complications ended in Reagan evading prosecution by his affiliates saying he had no knowledge of the affair.

Policy violations, propriety, and violations of the law…While President Reagan and his administration may have had good intentions, the actions undertaken by certain individuals while carrying out the operations mentioned above, did in fact, violate laws and executive orders, and as a result, put the offenders in direct conflict with the rule of law.

Additionally, documents were shredded to mask the paper trail in the White House. Therefore, no connection between the scandal and President Reagan was ever proven. Whenever Reagan was asked about his knowledge of the Iran-Contra affair, he would claim, "I don't remember." Regardless, during the Iran-Contra Scandal, only 14 percent of Americans believed the president when he said he had not traded arms for hostages.

In 1989 the United States invaded the Panama Canal. President George Bush was responsible for the action. The United States government felt that the President of Panama was keeping the United States from having control over the small nation that was supposed to be controlled by the United States. So then the United States thought that they needed to restore control once again, this caused President Bush to invade the country. The invasion was nothing but horrifying and pure death and many innocent lives were lost according to the documentary. The United States invaded with 21,000 troops and didn’t take it easily. The United States government was very discrete with the invasion from the rest of the world and the media covered it as a light and

The purpose of this essay is to expose George W. Bush as the fraud he is. From rigging the 2000 presidential election, to waging war on a country that had no connection to the 9/11 bombings on the World Trade Centre Twin Towers. George Bush must be shown for what he really is – a liar, a thief, and a criminal. This essay will go into detail about what Bush is currently doing, how he “won” the 2000 Presidential Election, and what he did before he was president

After reading the article of Henkin on the Iran-contra scandal, "The Constitution for its Third Century: Foreign Affairs" I do agree that Congress should have the ability to steer foreign affairs by withholding appropriations. The Constitution of the United States provides extensive powers meant to shape foreign policy via the activism of the congressional representatives. This has a great impact on foreign policy. However, the powers have changed over time.

The data in Table 1 show that President Reagan’s speeches did in fact make him more popular, as more speeches increased his popularity rather than decreased it. Out of the speeches analyzed, seventy-three percent showed an increase in approval ratings, with an average increase of four percent.