Wednesday, June 30, 2010

Rethinking Iran-Contra

By Robert Parry
July 1, 2010

The conventional view of the Iran-Contra scandal is that it covered the period 1985-86, when President Ronald Reagan became concerned about the fate of American hostages in Lebanon and agreed to secretly sell weapons to Iran’s Islamist government to gain its help in freeing the captives.

Read on.
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4 comments:

john mccarthy said...

As a student of Guerrilla Warfare it was easy to see the handwriting on the wall of disaster re the preordained fate of the Contra's effort in Nicaragua.

During the fifties, sixties and seventies, Anastasio Samoza, President of Nicaragua and graduate of the West Point class of 1946, organized the Guardia National (National Guard) of Nicaragua which became, in effect, the National Police. Prior to the evolution of the Sandinista Movement there was no organized resistance to the government.

Suppressive measures fueled the Sandinista's cause (named after General Sandino who was assassinated by Samoza's father after the ten year war in 1929-38 for control of the country in which 10,000 US Marines were killed in action supporting "Tacho" Samoza)

What the Contra's were relying on, as in each and every case involving Guerrilla Warfare, is the support of the population for their efforts against the entrenched Sandinista government. The failure of popular support for the Contra's emanated from the fact that former members of Samoza's Guardia National became the "Contras" supported and funded by Oliver North and the "Enterprise's" activities involving the import of Cocaine to the US in order to financially support the Contras because Congress had cut off the funding of the Contras. (Nothing wrong with defying Congress if you work for the "CIA Inside the CIA")

The Guardia had a terrible reputation for abuse, terror, shake downs, and immunity for crimes against humanity against the Nicaraguan population. The Guardia had zero chance for success as the population sided with the Sandinista from the first days of fighting. The population became the eyes and ears for the Sandinista Movement thereby insuring the defeat of military actions of the Contras.

I saw this evolve first hand as I was working for a mining company in Nicaragua during 1977-78.

Obviously, Ollie North was never a student of Guerrilla Warfare but William Casey most assuredly should have been aware of the dire consequences of this shortsighted effort as a result of his own experiences in the OSS during WWII.

It appears that none of the principals involved at CIA and NSC had ever read Mao's Little Red Book.

The same principal applies to the activities in Afghanistan, Iraq and most assuredly to Iran if that card is dealt by the "Cowboy Mentality" of the US Foreign Policy brain trusts.

Remember the "Enterprise"?

Sat Jul 03, 04:14:00 AM 2010
john mccarthy said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Sat Jul 03, 04:19:00 AM 2010
john mccarthy said...

(Part 2)
The Guardia had a terrible reputation for abuse, terror, shake downs, and immunity for crimes against humanity against the Nicaraguan population. The Guardia had zero chance for success as the population sided with the Sandinista from the first days of fighting. The population became the eyes and ears for the Sandinista Movement thereby insuring the defeat of military actions of the Contras.

I saw this evolve first hand as I was working for a mining company in Nicaragua during 1977-78.

Obviously, Ollie North was never a student of Guerrilla Warfare but William Casey most assuredly should have been aware of the dire consequences of this shortsighted effort as a result of his own experiences in the OSS during WWII.

It appears that none of the principals involved at CIA and NSC had ever read Mao's Little Red Book.

The same principal applies to the activities in Afghanistan, Iraq and most assuredly to Iran if that card is dealt by the "Cowboy Mentality" of the US Foreign Policy brain trusts.

Remember the "Enterprise"?

Sat Jul 03, 04:25:00 AM 2010
Anonymous said...

Injustice EPITOMIZED!

Sun Jul 04, 09:55:00 PM 2010

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