http://www.cooperativeresearch.org The Center for Grassroots Oversight aims to provide the public with a means to collaborate on investigations at the grassroots level. en-us http://www.cooperativeresearch.org/context.jsp?item=irancontraaffair_211#irancontraaffair_211 http://www.cooperativeresearch.org/context.jsp?item=irancontraaffair_211#irancontraaffair_211 During a flight to La Cieba, Honduras, CIA operative D.G. "Chip" Tatum is instructed to make contact with Major Felix Rodriguez, assigned by Oliver North as Tatum's local handler. Upon arrival in La Cieba, Tatum meets Rodriguez, who then takes the crew to a CIA safe house for the night. Following dinner, Tatum and Rodriguez plan their four-month support calender. Tatum is scheduled to leave Honduras in June 1985. Tatum is instructed that in addition to flying normal MEDEVAC missions, his duties will include a covert group of missions, the control word for these missions being Pegasus, and with Pegasus missions to take priority over normal medical evacuations. Rodriguez also instructs Tatum as to his chain of command. Missions could be ordered by any of the following: Oliver North (assistant national security advisor to the White House); Amiram Nir (former Israeli intelligence officer (Mossad) and advisor to Vice President Bush); Felix Rodriguez (CIA). bretep7 2012-01-14T12:39:21+01:00 http://www.cooperativeresearch.org/context.jsp?item=a121484gateswar#a121484gateswar http://www.cooperativeresearch.org/context.jsp?item=a121484gateswar#a121484gateswar Deputy Director of Intelligence Robert Gates sends what he calls a "straight talk" memo to his boss, CIA Director William Casey. Gates recommends the US openly deploy military forces to cripple Nicaragua's "Marxist-Leninist" Sandinista government and elevate the Contras into power. Among his "politically more difficult" recommendations, Gates pushes for "the use of air strikes to destroy a considerable portion of Nicaragua's military buildup." Gates's recommendations, which would be tantamount to the US declaring war on Nicaragua, will in large part not be followed. mtuck 2010-10-24T18:21:27+02:00 http://www.cooperativeresearch.org/context.jsp?item=a1985reaganwithdraw#a1985reaganwithdraw http://www.cooperativeresearch.org/context.jsp?item=a1985reaganwithdraw#a1985reaganwithdraw President Reagan unilaterally withdraws the US from the 1956 Friendship, Commerce, and Navigation Treaty with Nicaragua. He also ends the US's acceptance of compulsory jurisdiction for disputes heard by the UN International Court of Justice, which had cited the treaty in a ruling against the US over its mining of Nicaraguan harbors. The actions are well beyond any presidential powers granted by the Constitution, but neither Congress nor the media raise any serious objections. mtuck 2009-06-29T11:12:41+02:00 http://www.cooperativeresearch.org/context.jsp?item=a1282boland1#a1282boland1 http://www.cooperativeresearch.org/context.jsp?item=a1282boland1#a1282boland1 The first of three so-called "Boland amendments" becomes law. Named for Representative Edward Boland (D-MA), the chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, the amendment is part of a larger appropriations bill. The amendment restricts US humanitarian aid to the Contras, and prohibits the use of US funds "for the purpose of overthrowing the government of Nicaragua." The Reagan administration gets around the amendment by saying that its actions in support of the Contras are merely designed to force the Sandinistas to come to a peace agreement with the Contras, not to bring down the Nicaraguan government. mtuck 2009-05-29T12:46:46+02:00 http://www.cooperativeresearch.org/context.jsp?item=a06232587ledeenkickback#a06232587ledeenkickback http://www.cooperativeresearch.org/context.jsp?item=a06232587ledeenkickback#a06232587ledeenkickback Testimony in the Iran-Contra investigations turns to the possibility that NSC aide Michael Ledeen may have profited from the US sales of arms to Iran through Israel . Ledeen's former supervisor at the Department of Defense, Noel Koch, who has long suspected Ledeen of spying for Israel (see and ), says that he first became suspicious of Ledeen when he learned that the price Ledeen had negotiated for the sale to the Israeli government of basic TOW missiles was $2,500 each. Koch found that no TOW missile had ever been sold to any foreign government for less than $6,800 per unit. Under orders from his superiors in the department, Koch renegotiated the deal with an Israeli official, eventually raising the price to $4,500 per missile, almost twice what Ledeen had "negotiated" in Israel. Author Stephen Green, who will write two books on US-Israeli relations, will comment, "There are two possibilities here--one would be a kickback, as suspected by his NSC colleagues, and the other would be that Michael Ledeen was effectively negotiating for Israel, not the US." mtuck 2008-12-27T12:56:39+01:00 http://www.cooperativeresearch.org/context.jsp?item=alate84ledeennsc#alate84ledeennsc http://www.cooperativeresearch.org/context.jsp?item=alate84ledeennsc#alate84ledeennsc Neoconservative academic Michael Ledeen, who left the Defense Department under suspicion of engaging in espionage on behalf of Israel , gains a position at the National Security Council. His boss is Lieutenant Colonel Oliver North (see and ). According to Iran-Contra investigators, it is Ledeen who suggests to North "that Israeli contacts might be useful in obtaining release of the US hostages in Lebanon" . Ledeen is granted high-level security clearance. mtuck 2008-12-24T18:48:09+01:00 http://www.cooperativeresearch.org/context.jsp?item=a040985ledeenriskperes#a040985ledeenriskperes http://www.cooperativeresearch.org/context.jsp?item=a040985ledeenriskperes#a040985ledeenriskperes NSC Middle East analyst Donald Fortier writes to his boss, National Security Adviser Robert McFarlane, of his concerns that NSC consultant Michael Ledeen might be a risk for passing classified information to Israel . According to Fortier, NSC staffers agree that Ledeen's role in the secret hostage negotiations with Iran should be limited to ferrying messages to Israeli Prime Minister Shimon Peres regarding Israel's role in the negotiations, and Ledeen should specifically not be entrusted to ask Peres for detailed operational information. Paul 2008-12-22T11:41:30+01:00 http://www.cooperativeresearch.org/context.jsp?item=a012486ledeenprofiteer#a012486ledeenprofiteer http://www.cooperativeresearch.org/context.jsp?item=a012486ledeenprofiteer#a012486ledeenprofiteer National Security Council official Oliver North writes to National Security Adviser John Poindexter that his aide, consultant Michael Ledeen, may be illegally profiting from the sale of arms to Iran through Israel . mtuck 2008-12-22T11:38:56+01:00 http://www.cooperativeresearch.org/context.jsp?item=a011686ledeenpolygraphed#a011686ledeenpolygraphed http://www.cooperativeresearch.org/context.jsp?item=a011686ledeenpolygraphed#a011686ledeenpolygraphed National Security Council official Oliver North tells National Security Adviser John Poindexter that his consultant, neoconservative Michael Ledeen, is no longer trustworthy. Ledeen has long been suspected of operating as a spy for Israel (see and ). North tells Poindexter that "for [the] security of the Iran initiative," Ledeen should be asked to take periodic polygraph examinations. mtuck 2008-12-20T19:06:39+01:00 http://www.cooperativeresearch.org/context.jsp?item=a060685shultzledeen#a060685shultzledeen http://www.cooperativeresearch.org/context.jsp?item=a060685shultzledeen#a060685shultzledeen Secretary of State George Shultz writes to National Security Adviser Robert McFarlane that "Israel's record of dealings with Iran since the fall of the Shah and during the hostage crisis [shows] that Israel's agenda is not the same as ours." Referring to the plan concocted by NSC staffer Oliver North and North's consultant, neoconservative and likely Israeli spy Michael Ledeen , to seek Israeli help in freeing the American hostages in Lebanon (see and ), Shultz writes, "Consequently doubt whether an intelligence relationship such as what Ledeen has in mind would be one which we could fully rely upon and it could seriously skew our own perception and analysis of the Iranian scene." mtuck 2008-12-20T18:55:05+01:00