Which Was Worse: Iran/Contra or Operation 'Fast and Furious'?

AWR Hawkins

July 16, 2011

In the summer of 1985, persons within the Reagan administration sold hundreds of anti-tank missiles to Iran in exchange for the release of an American hostage named Benjamin Weir. For more than a year afterward, hundreds upon hundreds more missiles and missile parts were sold for the release of other hostages being held in Iran as well.

The money received for the missiles was then sent to Contras in Nicaragua to support their efforts against the communist Sandinistas. (The Sandinistas were revolutionaries who had seized power in Nicaragua a year before Reagan was elected president, while the Contras were counter revolutionaries whom persons inside the Reagan administration were relying on to curb the further spread of communism.)

With subtle changes along the way regarding the price paid for the weapons, the way the weapons were delivered, and the recipients of the weapons, the sales to Iran and the flow of money to the Contras continued unabated for over a year.

Then, in late 1986, everything came to light and what we all know now as the “Iran/Contra scandalâ€