Iran-Contra Affair Exposed: US Secretly Sold Arms to Iran

A Lebanese newspaper reveals that the Reagan administration secretly sold weapons to Iran — violating its own arms embargo — and used the proceeds to illegally fund Nicaraguan Contras.

Despite publicly calling Iran a terrorist state and imposing an arms embargo, the Reagan administration secretly sold weapons to Iran between 1985 and 1986, hoping to secure the release of American hostages held by Hezbollah in Lebanon. The proceeds from those arms sales — estimated at over $30 million — were then illegally diverted to fund anti-communist Contra rebels in Nicaragua, circumventing a congressional ban. The scandal, revealed in November 1986 by Lebanese magazine Ash-Shiraa, caused a major political crisis for Reagan and exposed the profound contradictions of US policy toward Iran. National Security Council staffer Oliver North became the central figure. The affair damaged American credibility and left US-Iran relations more entangled and duplicitous than ever.