United States

The FBI Administrative Index, known as ADEX for short (see Late 1971-1985), is transferred to the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA). The index contains the names and background information of approximately 12,000 individuals considered to be potential threats in times of crisis. Citizens on the list are to be closely monitored and/or detained in the event of a national emergency. Documents later obtained by the Austin American-Statesman will reveal an internal struggle between FBI Director William Webster, who recommends the FBI maintain control of the list, and Attorney General Edwin Meese, who, along with Reagan adviser Robert McFarlane, demands the list be handed over to FEMA. The list ultimately ends up under the control of FEMA. [Texas Observer, 5/15/1987]

Systems Evaluations Incorporated, a company recently founded by Fred Westerman, a newly retired 20-year Army intelligence veteran, is contracted by the Army Corps of Engineers to help set up secret storage facilities in five states for the ultra-secretive Continuity of Government program. The Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) and the clandestine National Program Office (see (1982 -1991)) will operate the facilities and oversee their construction. Within a year, Westerman will begin to report to government officials instances of waste, fraud, and abuse within the program (see 1986-1987). His job will be threatened in November 1987 (see November 1987) and his contract will be canceled in December of that year (see December 1987). Westerman will file a lawsuit against the government alleging FEMA burglarized Systems Evaluations’ offices in late 1987 (see Late 1987) and that the government launched a surveillance campaign against him (see November 1988). The lawsuit will be frozen when the Justice Department opens an investigation of Westerman (see November 1988) and the suit will later be sealed after an in-depth report highlighting Westerman’s case is published by a major magazine (see August 8, 1989). Westerman will lose another contract, along with his security clearances, in 1990 (see 1990), and by November 1991, he will be unemployable, several hundred thousand dollars in debt, and unable to gain any restitution from the government (see November 1991). [Emerson, 8/7/1989; San Francisco Chronicle, 8/8/1989; Associated Press, 9/11/1989; CNN Special Assignment, 11/17/1991]

Dartmouth College chaplain Richard Hyde files a libel and invasion of privacy lawsuit against the conservative Dartmouth Review, a student newspaper funded by off-campus conservative sources (see 1980). Hyde files the suit in response to the Review’s repeated characterization of him as a supporter of the North American Man Boy Love Association (NAMBLA), an organization that promotes pedophilia and child pornography. The Review has often characterized Hyde as homosexual. It eventually settles the case out of court and prints an apology. [Dartmouth Free Press, 9/20/2006]

The cover of Joseph Scheidler’s ‘Closed.’ [Source: Traditional Crusade (.org)]Two books are privately published by anti-abortion activists: Closed: 99 Ways to Stop Abortion, by Joseph Scheidler (see 1980), and The Abortion Buster’s Manual, by Kevin Sherlock. Sherlock’s book focuses on ways to identify and harass abortion providers, which anti-abortion activists have identified as the “weak link” in the “abortion industry,” and details legal means of harassment, including searching public records for malpractice lawsuits, criminal histories, or abortion-related deaths, which can be used as propaganda against the identified providers. Scheidler’s book discusses both legal and illegal ways to disrupt a clinic’s functions, including what he calls “aggressive sidewalk counseling sessions” (protesters screaming, shouting, and waving posters depicting bloody fetuses at clinic clients, among other “counseling” techniques), and full-scale clinic “blockades” using protesters and their vehicles. Scheidler also advocates harassing doctors and patients at their homes and workplaces. Both books will become “bibles” for anti-abortion activists. [Kushner, 2003, pp. 38-39]

Anti-abortion activists with the Pro-Life Action Network (PLAN) gather at a motel in Appleton, Wisconsin, to celebrate their successes and plan further actions. The PLAN members apparently count a wave of abortion clinic bombings and arsons as successes; the motel’s marquee reads, “Welcome Pro-Life Activists—Have a Blast,” and some PLAN members wear firecrackers on their name badges. One of the featured events of the gathering is the reading of a letter from imprisoned clinic arsonist Curt Beseda. In 2002, author and journalist Frederick Clarkson will write: “This small but seminal meeting in many ways epitomized the brazen yet banal nature of organized antiabortion extremism—a rah-rah atmosphere, like some perverse parody of a pep rally, in which threats of future violence were cloaked as free speech, and past criminal acts were celebrated as valid tools for intimidating fellow citizens. A fringe culture was coalescing.” [Ms. Magazine, 12/2002] At this and other PLAN meetings, PLAN president Joseph Scheidler vows to stop abortion “by any means necessary.” He has previously called PLAN a “pro-life mafia.” The organization proclaims “a year of pain and fear” for anyone seeking or providing abortion. [National Organization for Women, 9/2002; Ms. Magazine, 12/2002]

US banker Douglas McDermott says of the US-backed Venezuelan dictator Marcos Perez Jimenez, “You have the freedom here to do what you want with your money, and to me, that is worth all the political freedom in the world.” [Hunt, 9/1/2009, pp. 9]

William Pierce, the founder of the neo-Nazi National Alliance (see 1970-1974) and the author of the inflammatory and highly influential white supremacist novel The Turner Diaries (see 1978), purchases a large farm near Mill Point, West Virginia, for $95,000. Some will suggest that the money Pierce uses to buy the farm comes from armed robberies carried out by The Order (see Late September 1983), but those suggestions will remain unproven. Pierce and his followers will transform the farm into a large, fortified compound that serves as the Alliance’s national headquarters. [Center for New Community, 8/2002 ]

The cover of the first volume of ‘The Law that Never Was.’ [Source: Radaris (.com) / Amazon (.com)]Two anti-tax protesters, William “Bill” Benson and Martin J. “Red” Beckman, publish a two-volume book, The Law that Never Was, that argues the 16th Amendment, the constitutional amendment giving the federal government the authority to levy income taxes, is null and void (see 1951-1967, 1970-1972, 1976-1978, and Early 1980s). The arguments in the book include the idea that because the amendment was ratified by different states with small differences in capitalization and punctuation, it was never properly ratified, as well as the argument that since Ohio was not yet a state when it ratified the amendment, Ohio’s ratification of the amendment renders it null. The authors include other arguments—the Internal Revenue Code is not “positive law”; the Internal Revenue Service is not a legitimate government agency; wages do not qualify as “taxable income”; “sovereign citizens” are exempt from income tax—all of which will be declared worthless and frivolous by various state and federal courts. The Anti-Defamation League will write that the arguments advanced by Benson and Beckman “are used again and again by tax protesters.… When a tax protest argument fails in court, the response among tax protesters is typically not to conclude that the argument was erroneous but rather to assume that the judge was wrong, corrupt, or deliberately misinterpreting the law.” Benson is a former investigator for the Illinois Internal Revenue Service, while Beckman is a virulent anti-Semite who accuses Jews of worshiping Satan and says the Holocaust was God’s “judgment upon a people who believe Satan is their god.” In 1991, Benson will be convicted of tax fraud and tax evasion, and will be sued by the US government to stop him from promoting an “abusive tax shelter” by selling what he calls a “Reliance Defense Package” while doing business as “Constitutional Research Associates.” In 2007, a federal court will find that his Reliance Defense Package “contained false or fraudulent information concerning tax advice,” and will note that a circuit court “explicitly rejected Benson’s arguments that the Sixteenth Amendment was not properly ratified.” Benson’s work will frequently be cited by tax protesters, many of whom will be fined or convicted for relying on his claims. [Southern Poverty Law Center, 12/2001; Tax Protester Dossiers, 11/30/2009; Anti-Defamation League, 2011]

After commodities trader Marc Rich leaves the US over charges that he has evaded $48 million in tax in 1983, US authorities consider rendering him back to the US to face trial. [Grey, 2007, pp. 133] Howard Safir, head of the US Marshals Service, will later say that in 1985 he monitored Rich at his home in Switzerland in an attempt to serve an arrest warrant on him, so rendition may have been considered at this point. However, Rich will remain a fugitive until 2001, when he is pardoned by Bill Clinton. [Washington Post, 3/13/2001] Whenever rendition is considered, according to Safir, the plan is abandoned when the Swiss warn US agents they will be arrested if they try anything. [Grey, 2007, pp. 133]

Makhtab al-Khidamat offices in the US in the late 1980s. Some of the offices in fact were represented by single individuals. [Source: National Geographic] (click image to enlarge)Sheikh Abdullah Azzam, bin Laden’s mentor, makes repeated trips to the US and other countries, building up his Pakistan-based organization, Maktab al-Khidamat (MAK), or “Services Office” in English. It is also known as Al-Kifah, which means “struggle.” Azzam founded the Al-Kifah/MAK in 1984 (see Late 1984). Branches open in over 30 US cities, as Muslim-Americans donate millions of dollars to support the Afghan war against the Soviet Union. The most important branch, called the Al-Kifah Refugee Center, opens in Brooklyn, New York (see 1986-1993). Azzam is assassinated in a car bomb attack in late 1989 (see November 24, 1989). Bin Laden soon takes over the organization, which effectively morphs into al-Qaeda. His followers take over the US offices and they become financial conduits for al-Qaeda operations. [Lance, 2003, pp. 40-41]

The Central Intelligence Agency, which has been supporting indigenous Afghan groups fighting occupying Soviet forces, becomes unhappy with them due to infighting, and searches for alternative anti-Soviet allies. MSNBC will later comment: “[T]he CIA, concerned about the factionalism of Afghanistan made famous by Rudyard Kipling, found that Arab zealots who flocked to aid the Afghans were easier to ‘read’ than the rivalry-ridden natives. While the Arab volunteers might well prove troublesome later, the agency reasoned, they at least were one-dimensionally anti-Soviet for now. So [Osama] bin Laden, along with a small group of Islamic militants from Egypt, Pakistan, Lebanon, Syria and Palestinian refugee camps all over the Middle East, became the ‘reliable’ partners of the CIA in its war against Moscow.” The CIA does not usually deal with the Afghan Arabs directly, but through an intermediary, Pakistan’s ISI, which helps the Arabs through the Maktab al-Khidamat (MAK) run by Abdullah Azzam. [MSNBC, 8/24/1998] The agreement is sealed during a secret visit to Pakistan, where CIA Director William Casey commits the agency to support the ISI program of recruiting radical Muslims for the Afghan war from other Muslim countries around the world. In addition to the Gulf States, these include Turkey, the Philippines, and China. The ISI started their recruitment of radicals from other countries in 1982 (see 1982). This CIA cooperation is part of a joint CIA-ISI plan begun the year before to expand the “Jihad” beyond Afghanistan (see 1984-March 1985). [Rashid, 2001, pp. 128-129] Thousands of militant Arabs are trained under this program (see 1986-1992).

Sheikh Abdullah Azzam giving a speech in the US in February 1988. [Source: CNN]Bin Laden’s mentor Abdullah Azzam frequently travels all over the world with the apparent support of the CIA. Slate will later write, “Azzam trotted the globe during the 1980s to promote the Afghan jihad against the Soviets. By the time of his death in 1989, he had recruited between 16,000 and 20,000 mujaheddin from 20 countries to Afghanistan, visited 50 American cities to advance his cause, and dispatched acolytes to spread the gospel in 26 US states, not to mention across the Middle East and Europe.” Slate calls him “the Lenin of international jihad,” noting that he “didn’t invent his movement’s ideas, but he furthered them and put them into practice around the world.” [Slate, 4/16/2002] At the time, the US is supporting the Afghans fighting the Soviets and it will later be alleged that the CIA supported Azzam as part of this effort. Barnett Rubin, a Columbia University professor and senior fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations, will claim in 1995 that sources told him Azzam was “enlisted” by the CIA to help unite the fractious Afghan rebel groups. Rubin claims Azzam was considered a prime asset because of his “close connections to the Muslim Brotherhood, Saudi intelligence, and the Muslim World League.” But Azzam made no secret of his desire for a no compromise jihad to conquer the entire world. In 1988 in New Jersey, he says, “Blood and martyrdom are the only way to create a Muslim society” and he wants “to ignite the spark that may one day burn Western interests all over the world.” He is frequently accompanied on his US lecture tours by El-Sayyid Nosair and Clement Rodney Hampton-El, both of whom will later be convicted of al-Qaeda-linked attacks in the US. [New York Magazine, 3/17/1995] CAIR (Council on American-Islamic Relations) Executive Director Nihad Awad is a leader in the IAP (Islamic Association for Palestine) at this time. ISNA (Islamic Society of North America) affiliates, such as IAP and the MAYA (Muslim Arab Youth Association), host Azzam and arrange his visits to Islamic centers throughout the US. [New Republic, 2/27/2007]

Christopher Drogoul of the Atlanta branch of the Italian Banca Nazionale del Lavoro begins embezzling funds to Iraq. The funds consist of government backed loans meant for agricultural purposes as well as unreported loans that have been made in secret. While roughly half the funds will be used by Saddam Hussein’s government to purchase agricultural goods, the remainder will be used to “supply Iraqi missile, chemical, biological and nuclear weapons programs with industrial goods such as computer controlled machine tools, computers, scientific instruments, special alloy steel and aluminum, chemicals, and other industrial goods.” Additionally, the money spent on agriculture will allow Saddam Hussein’s regime to divert a significant portion of its own funds to the task of weapons development. [US Congress, 4/28/1992; Columbia Journalism Review, 3/1993] Between 1985 and 1989 roughly $5 billion makes its way to Iraq from the US. Internal government memos reveal that both the Federal Reserve and Department of Agriculture suspect that Iraq is using these funds inappropriately. Iraq eventually defaults on the government-backed loans, leaving US taxpayers with $2 billion dollars in unpaid debts. [Mother Jones, 1/1993; Columbia Journalism Review, 3/1993]

According to former Reagan Justice Department official Terry Eastland, writing in his 1992 book Energy in the Executive, the process of selecting Antonin Scalia as a Supreme Court Justice begins now, well before anyone knows there will be a vacancy for him. Attorney General Edwin Meese asks his assistant attorney general, William Bradford Reynolds, to advise him in preparing a nominee, “just in case.” Reynolds assembles a team of Justice Department officials, who examine about twenty possible choices, mostly federal judges, focusing primarily on conservative judicial philosophy. Two individuals stand out: Robert Bork and Scalia. Eastland writes, “Neither was ranked over the other; both were regarded as the best available, most well-qualified exponents of Reagan’s judicial philosophy.” Both are seen as powerful and influential legal figures. When Chief Justice Warren Burger announces his decision to retire from the bench, Reynolds advises Meese to choose Justice William Rehnquist to replace Burger as Chief Justice (see September 26, 1986), and to choose either Bork or Scalia to replace Rehnquist. Reagan makes the final decision: Scalia. [Dean, 2007, pp. 133]

In 1985, the CIA, MI6 (Britain’s intelligence agency), and the Pakistani ISI agree to launch guerrilla attacks from Afghanistan into then Soviet-controlled Tajikistan and Uzbekistan, attacking military installations, factories, and storage depots within Soviet territory. Some Afghans have been trained for this purpose since 1984 (see 1984-March 1985). The task is given to Gulbuddin Hekmatyar, an Afghan warlord closely linked to the ISI. According to an account in the Washington Post, in March 1987, small units cross from bases in northern Afghanistan into Tajikistan and launched their first rocket attacks against villages there. [Washington Post, 7/19/1992; Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, 9/23/2001] However, Mohammad Yousaf, a high-ranking ISI officer at the time, will later write a well regarded book about the Soviet-Afghan war and will give a different account. He will claim the attacks in the Soviet Union actually begin in 1985 and are much more numerous. He says, “These cross-border strikes were at their peak in 1986. Scores of attacks were made across the Amu (River)… Sometimes Soviet citizens joined in these operations, or came back into Afghanistan to join the mujaheddin… That we were hitting a sore spot was confirmed by the ferocity of the Soviets’ reaction. Virtually every incursion provoked massive aerial bombing and gunship attacks on all villages south of the river in the vicinity of our strike.” [Dreyfuss, 2005, pp. 286] By all accounts, these secret attacks are strongly backed by CIA Director William Casey and come to an end when he dies later in 1987. [Washington Post, 7/19/1992; Dreyfuss, 2005, pp. 285-286]

Several current and former top US officials—including Attorney General Edwin Meese; National Security Adviser Robert McFarlane; former Secretary of Energy, Secretary of Defense, and Director of the CIA James Schlesinger; and former Secretary of Interior; national security adviser, and deputy secretary of state Judge William B. Clark—attempt to make arrangements that will provide security and insurance for the proposed Iraq-Jordan Aqaba pipeline in order to obtain Iraqi approval for the project. They go to extraordinary lengths to satisfy the preconditions Iraq has set for the pipeline, including bribing Israeli Labor officials in exchange for assurances that Israel would not attack the pipeline and pushing the US government-backed Overseas Private Investment Fund and Citibank to provide a political-risk insurance fund with up to $400 million in coverage. Iraq and Jordan ultimately refuse the deal explaining that the plan “does not meet specific requirements of the Project and does not satisfy our objectives.” [Vallette, 3/24/2003]

A 2007 satellite image of the Khan Research Laboratories in Kahuta. [Source: GeoEye]Richard Barlow, an analyst working on Pakistan’s nuclear program who was released by the State Department in the early 1980s (see 1981-1982), is hired by the CIA’s Office of Scientific and Weapons Research (OSWR). Barlow re-analyzes the data and confirms his earlier conclusions—that Pakistan is pursuing a covert nuclear weapons program. Barlow learns about the trade in dual-use components—tools and equipment that can be used to make nuclear weapons, but also for other, non-nuclear purposes, meaning trade in them is hard to spot and regulate. One example of this is a California couple that exports dozens of high-speed cathode-ray oscilloscopes and special cameras to Hong Kong, where they are picked up by Pakistani agents. Barlow realizes that such a large number of oscilloscopes must be for nuclear weapons manufacturing, and also finds a link between the purchase and the Pakistan Atomic Energy Commission (PAEC). Barlow will later comment, “There was tons of it and most of it was ending up in [Pakistan]. Pakistan had a vast network of procurers, operating all over the world.” Barlow also finds that the material is going to a secret nuclear facility near Islamabad, the Khan Research Laboratories, where sensors pick up high levels of enriched uranium in the air and in dust on [trucks] leaving the laboratories. [New Yorker, 3/29/1993; Guardian, 10/13/2007] Despite this, in order to prevent Congress from cutting of aid to the anti-Soviet mujaheddin, which flows through Pakistan, US authorities will repeatedly insist Pakistan is not working on a nuclear program (see August 1985-October 1990).

Nine federal judges in Kansas sign a disciplinary complaint against Reverend Fred Phelps, the head of the virulently anti-gay Westboro Baptist Church (WBC) of Topeka, Kansas (see November 27, 1955 and After). Phelps, as are many of his children and in-laws, is a lawyer. The judges add five of his children and a daughter-in-law to the complaint. The complaint alleges that the seven Phelps family members made false accusations against the judges. In 1987, Phelps’s position is weakened when he is censured for writing abusive letters to potential defendants threatening lawsuits if his demands are not met. In 1989, Phelps agrees to stop practicing law entirely in federal court, in return for his family members’ continuing privilege to practice law in those courts. His daughter Margie Phelps is suspended for practicing law in federal and state courts for one year, and his son Fred Phelps Jr. is suspended from those courts for six months. [Southern Poverty Law Center, 4/2001]

ISI headquarters in Islamabad, Pakistan. [Source: Banded Artists Productions]The Pakistani ISI starts a special cell of agents who use profits from heroin production for covert actions “at the insistence of the CIA.” “This cell promotes the cultivation of opium, the extraction of heroin in Pakistani and Afghan territories under mujaheddin control. The heroin is then smuggled into the Soviet controlled areas, in an attempt to turn the Soviet troops into heroin addicts. After the withdrawal of the Soviet troops, the ISI’s heroin cell started using its network of refineries and smugglers for smuggling heroin to the Western countries and using the money as a supplement to its legitimate economy. But for these heroin dollars, Pakistan’s legitimate economy must have collapsed many years ago.” [Financial Times, 8/10/2001] The ISI grows so powerful on this money, that “even by the shadowy standards of spy agencies, the ISI is notorious. It is commonly branded ‘a state within the state,’ or Pakistan’s ‘invisible government.’” [Time, 5/6/2002]

Salem bin Laden tells one of his employees, George Harrington, that his brother Osama, is, according to a later account by Harrington, “the liaison between the US, the Saudi government, and the Afghan rebels.” Salem, head of the bin Laden family, also says that he must visit Osama in Peshawar, a base inside Pakistan for the anti-Soviet mujaheddin, to check on what equipment the Saudi government is funneling to him. The two men fly up together with another employee, Bengt Johansson, and meet Osama that day. Osama also gives his brother and the two employees a tour of some facilities in Peshawar, including refugee camps, a hospital and an orphanage, and Salem films them to publicize his brother’s charitable work. [Coll, 2008, pp. 7-9]

Buoyed by recent breakthroughs in dialogue with the Soviet Union (see February 23, 1984), the US and USSR resume arms control talks, these combining both the INF (see September 1981 through November 1983) and START (see May 1982 and After) talks into a single set of discussions. [Scoblic, 2008, pp. 139]

In January 1985, the CIA delivers a secret report about the criminal BCCI back to the Treasury Department. In an extraordinary departure from standard procedure, the report is hand-delivered by a CIA agent and printed on plain paper with no markings to indicate it came from the CIA. The report is given to Douglas Mulholland, a Treasury official serving as the CIA’s main link to that department. Mulholland then hand-delivers the report to Treasury Secretary Donald Regan, and calls its contents “dynamite.” It is not known what is in the report, but the Treasury Department sends back word that it wants to know more. However, as Time magazine reporters Jonathan Beaty and S. C. Gwynne will later relate: “Suddenly, and for no apparent reason, Treasury lost all interest in BCCI.… Someone had… gotten to Regan and Mulholland, and the message had been unambiguous: back off.” The Treasury Department takes no action against BCCI, even though the evidence of the bank’s involvement in money laundering by this time is overwhelming. [Beaty and Gwynne, 1993, pp. 325-328]

The Reagan administration takes another step in attempting to “purge” the federal bureaucracy of those who disagree with its policies (see February 1981 and After). President Reagan issues an executive order requiring agencies to annually submit a cost-benefit analysis of their proposed new rules to the White House, giving administration officials the chance to object to, delay, and block regulations it opposes for ideological reasons. Reagan attorney Douglas Kmiec will later write that this scheme is a major part of the Reagan administration’s attempt to implement the “unitary executive” theory of executive power (see April 30, 1986). Kmiec will write that though White House objections have no legal weight because Congress has given the agencies the power to make rules by law, the White House often wins the argument anyway. [Savage, 2007, pp. 304-305]

Quoting a French intelligence report posted by PBS Frontline, The New Yorker reports, “During the nineteen-eighties, when the Reagan administration secretly arranged for an estimated $34 million to be funneled through Saudi Arabia to the Contras in Nicaragua, [Osama’s eldest brother] Salem bin Laden aided in this cause.” [PBS Frontline, 2001; New Yorker, 11/5/2001]

Khan Research Laboratories in Kahuta. [Source: CBC] (click image to enlarge)The CIA obtains a complete set of the floor plans for a Pakistani uranium-enrichment plant at Kahuta, 12 miles west of Islamabad, while the plant is under construction. The plans show that the hot, or radioactive, work areas at Kahuta had been built as many as five stories underground, to guard against a surprise Indian bombing raid. [New Yorker, 3/29/1993] The CIA will also obtain detailed information about what happens at the plant when it comes into operation (see (1987)).

Friar Lawrence Jenco. [Source: Jenco Foundation]Friar Lawrence Jenco, an American serving as the director of Catholic Relief Services in Beirut, is kidnapped by Hezbollah militants. He will be freed in July 1986. [New York Times, 11/19/1987; Jenco Foundation, 9/28/2007]

According to author Steve Coll, US President Ronald Reagan may be given a briefing about Osama bin Laden’s charitable work in the Soviet-Afghan War, and may also see a video showing aspects of the work. If this is true, the briefing and video would come from Salem bin Laden, head of the bin Laden family, who made the video recently when visiting his brother Osama (see Early 1985).
Summit - Salem is in Washington at this time to attend a summit between Reagan and King Fahd of Saudi Arabia. It is unclear what Salem’s role is at the summit, although one of the key areas of co-operation between the US and Saudi Arabia is support for the Afghan mujaheddin, and his brother Osama is a key figure who frequently travels between Saudi Arabia and mujaheddin bases in Pakistan. An attorney will later recall seeing a photograph of Salem and Reagan together at the meeting, but the photo will apparently be destroyed before it can be published.
Possible Briefing - Coll will comment: “It seems probable that when Salem reached Washington that winter, he would have passed to King Fahd, if not directly to the White House, the video evidence he had just gathered documenting Osama’s humanitarian work on the Afghan frontier.” Coll will add that Reagan takes pains to acknowledge Saudi Arabia’s efforts to support Afghan refugees on the Pakistani frontier, saying: “Their many humanitarian contributions touch us deeply.… Saudi aid to refugees uprooted from their homes in Afghanistan has not gone unnoticed here.” Coll will point out that the leading Saudi provider of such aid is Osama bin Laden, and that “Reagan’s language suggested that he had been given at least a general briefing about Osama’s work.” [Coll, 2008, pp. 11-12]

Inslaw, the owner and developer of the enhanced PROMIS software, declares bankruptcy, applying for Chapter 11 reorganization at the Bankruptcy Court for the District of Columbia. Inslaw’s poor financial condition is at least partly due to a dispute with the Justice Department over the software, as the department owes it a minimum of $1.6 million in contract payments for implementation, but is withholding them. [US Congress, 9/10/1992]

Ronald Reagan with Afghan mujaheddin leaders. [Source: Ronald Reagan Presidential Library] (click image to enlarge)President Reagan issues a secret National Security Decision Directive to sharply escalate US covert action in Afghanistan. No longer content to simply help harass Soviet forces in Afghanistan, the directive leads to sharp increase in military and other aid to the mujaheddin to completely defeat the Soviets. The CIA begins supplying mujaheddin rebels with “extensive satellite reconnaissance data of Soviet targets on the Afghan battlefield, plans for military operations based on the satellite intelligence, intercepts of Soviet communications, secret communications networks for the rebels, delayed timing devices for tons of C-4 plastic explosives for urban sabotage and sophisticated guerrilla attacks, long-range sniper rifles, a targeting device for mortars that was linked to a US Navy satellite, wire-guided anti-tank missiles, and other equipment.” CIA Director William Casey also sees the directive as an opportunity to launch attacks inside the Soviet Union itself (see 1984-March 1985 and 1985-1987). [Washington Post, 7/19/1992]

Richard Butler, the head of the white separatist and neo-Nazi organization Aryan Nations (see Early 1970s), is subpoenaed to testify before a grand jury in Seattle, as part of the federal effort to convict members of the violent white separatist group The Order (see Late December 1984 - April 1985). Butler escapes indictment, even though he has strong connections with The Order (see 1980-1982), and after the Order trial, denounces the Order members who testified against their former colleagues. [Southern Poverty Law Center, 2010]

Soviet leader Konstantin Chernenko, in office just 13 months, dies of a long illness. Chernenko had moved to reopen talks with the US (see February 23, 1984 and Early 1985). President Reagan sends Vice President George H. W. Bush to the funeral with an invitation to hold a summit meeting with Chernenko’s successor, Mikhail Gorbachev. Gorbachev signals his acceptance (see November 16-19, 1985). [Scoblic, 2008, pp. 139]

The US and the Soviet Union engage in the Nuclear and Space Talks (NST) in Geneva. The US wants to discuss a transition from mutual nuclear deterrence based solely on the threat of nuclear retaliation (the concept of MAD, or Mutual Assured Destruction) to increased reliance on ground- and space-based defense systems such as its Strategic Defense Initiative (see March 23, 1983). In its turn, the USSR wants a comprehensive ban on research, development, testing, and deployment of “space-strike arms.” [Federation of American Scientists, 1/15/2008]

Inslaw representatives Elliot Richardson and Donald Santarelli, a former administrator of the Law Enforcement Assistance Administration, meet with acting Deputy Attorney General Lowell Jensen to discuss a resolution of the Inslaw affair concerning the Justice Department’s alleged misappropriation of enhanced PROMIS software. Richardson and Santarelli ask for rapid talks to resolve disputes that have caused the department to withhold money from Inslaw and the company to go bankrupt, that the department consider a new proposal for work by Inslaw, and that Jensen appoint somebody to investigate Inslaw’s claims that some department officials, in particular C. Madison Brewer (see 1976 and April 1982), are biased against it. The business proposal is that Inslaw implement PROMIS in smaller US attorneys’ offices. This was originally covered by a contract between Inslaw and the department (see March 1982), but this part of the contract was terminated in 1984 (see December 29, 1983 and February 1984). [US Congress, 9/10/1992] The department rejects the proposal for additional work, but it is unclear whether the allegations against Brewer and others are investigated (see After March 13, 1985).

The Justice Department starts an internal review of the Inslaw affair, but the content of the review will be disputed. The review follows a meeting at which Inslaw representatives made three requests (see March 13, 1985): that the department negotiate on a resolution of the disputes between it and Inslaw; that it consider a new proposal made by Inslaw for additional work; and that it investigate allegations of misconduct against departmental personnel. The review is ordered by Deputy Attorney General Lowell Jensen and performed by Deputy Associate Attorney General Jay Stephens.
Jensen's Version - According to Jensen, the review is to look at the bias allegations. He will say he recalls discussing the results of Stephens’ review, adding that, based on Stephens’ assessment of the allegations, no review by the Office of Professional Responsibility is merited.
Stephens' Version - However, Stephens will tell the House Judiciary Committee under oath that he does not undertake a review of the misconduct allegations, but only looks at Inslaw’s business proposal. The committee will point out that this is in “direct contradiction” of Jensen’s version. While examining the proposal, Stephens receives several telephone calls from Inslaw attorneys Charles Work and Elliot Richardson. He feels they are lobbying the department very hard because they believe Inslaw has what the committee will call “some special relationship” with the department. According to a report by the committee, Work and Richardson attempt to convey that, “based on a longstanding relationship between the department and Inslaw, the department should look favorably on Inslaw’s new business proposal.”
Outcome of Review - However, Stephens reports to Jensen that the need for Inslaw’s business proposal is questionable and the department thinks the work can be done in-house. Jensen then writes to Richardson, saying that the department does not have an immediate need for the work, and will not act on the proposal.
Comment by House Committee - The committee will comment, “Because the department did not adequately investigate Inslaw’s allegations, the company was forced into expensive, time-consuming litigation as the only means by which the department’s misappropriation of Inslaw’s enhanced PROMIS could be exposed.” [US Congress, 9/10/1992]

A photograph of Terry Anderson provided by his captors. [Source: Maher Attar / Corbis]Terry Anderson, a reporter with the Associated Press, is kidnapped by Hezbollah militants in Beirut. [New York Times, 11/19/1987] Anderson will be held hostage for seven years, longer than any other American captive. His name will become synonymous with the Iran/Lebanese hostage crisis. He will be released in 1991, as the 16-year civil war in Lebanon comes to a close. [CNN, 1996]

The Turkish-US Business Council is formed by the Council of the Foreign Economic Relations Board of Turkey (DEIK) to represent Turkish business interests. [White House, 1999] According to the DEIK’s own website, however, the DEIK itself is not established until 1986, after which point it functions as an umbrella organization for a number of foreign trade organizations, of which the Turkish-US Business Council is the largest and most important. [Turkish-US Business Council, 2004] The Turkish-US Business Council is the parent organization of its American counterpart, the American-Turkish council (see February 9, 1988).

NSC Middle East analyst Donald Fortier writes to his boss, National Security Adviser Robert McFarlane, of his concerns that NSC consultant Michael Ledeen (see Late 1984) might be a risk for passing classified information to Israel (see 1983). 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. [CounterPunch, 2/28/2004]

David Tate, one of two members of the now-defunct white supremacist group The Order to escape the government’s massive prosecution of its members (see Late December 1984 - April 1985), is stopped by two Missouri state troopers conducting random vehicle and license checks. He is trying to flee to a Christian Identity (see 1960s and After) survivalist compound called the Covenant, the Sword, and the Arm of the Lord (CSA). Tate opens fire on the two officers with a MAC-10 submachine gun, killing one and critically wounding the other. He is captured five days later hiding in a city park in Arkansas. He will be convicted of assault and murder, and sentenced to life without parole. Federal authorities will use the Tate incident to arrest the CSA leadership (see 1983); the organization will soon fold. [Anti-Defamation League, 2005; HistoryLink, 12/6/2006]

In the case of Hunter v. Underwood, the US Supreme Court rules that states have the right to legally strip convicted criminals of the right to vote as long as no “racially discriminatory intent” is in effect, and strikes down a portion of Alabama law that is found to be discriminatory. The Court rules unanimously, 8-0 (Justice Lewis Powell does not participate in the case). The two plaintiffs—one black and one white—were barred from voting in Alabama after being charged with a misdemeanor crime, and filed a lawsuit against the state. A district court ruled against them, denying that Alabama’s Constitution disenfranchises citizens convicted of crimes in a discriminatory fashion (see 1802-1857 and 1901). The Supreme Court overturns that decision, finding that Alabama’s law violates the Fourteenth Amendment. The fact that the relevant portion of the Alabama Constitution “may have been adopted to discriminate against poor whites as well as against blacks would not render nugatory the purpose to discriminate against blacks, it being clear that the latter was a ‘but-for’ motivation.… There is no evidence that the disenfranchisement of those convicted of crimes involving moral turpitude was a motivating purpose of the 1901 Convention” (referring to the 1901 revision of the Alabama Constitution to use disenfranchisement as a tool to prevent blacks from voting—see 1901). [Hunter v. Underwood - 471 US 222 (1985), 4/16/1985; ProCon, 10/19/2010; Oyez (.org), 2012; Marcus McClellan, 5/14/2012]

Secretary of State George Shultz offers prominent neoconservative and State Department official Elliott Abrams (see Early 1970s) the position of assistant secretary of state for inter-American affairs (ARA), overseeing the department’s South and Central American issues and initiatives, as well as those for the Caribbean. Abrams accepts and, according to State Department notes of the meeting, promises to “manage the emergence of EA [Abrams] as King of LA [Latin America].” Abrams begins his duties in July 1985, and quickly becomes one of the State Department’s most vocal supporters of Nicaragua’s Contra movement, often appearing before Congress as an emissary of the Reagan administration to ask for funds for the insurgent group. [Final Report of the Independent Counsel for Iran/Contra Matters: Chapter 25: United States v. Elliott Abrams: November 1986, 8/4/1993]

In an analysis of an Inslaw proposal for the resolution of the PROMIS dispute, the Executive Office for US Attorneys (EOUSA), a Justice Department component, says that Inslaw has not made any proprietary enhancements to the software. “It appears [to the department] that there are no proprietary enhancements,” says the analysis sent by William P. Tyson, the EOUSA director, to Jay Stephens, the deputy associate attorney general. “All proposals received from Inslaw attempt to force the department into acknowledging Inslaw’s proprietary interest in the US attorneys’ version of PROMIS by offering a license agreement for software maintenance,” Tyson adds. According to the memo, accepting Inslaw’s proposal “would, in effect, ratify Inslaw’s claim that the software is proprietary; not only the micro-computer version which Inslaw proposes to develop, but also the Prime mini-computer version currently operational in 20 districts.” The Justice Department’s position means that it would have unlimited rights to the software. The House Judiciary Committee will later comment that the department “may have used its ‘unlimited rights’ posture as a pretextual basis for its national and international distribution of Enhanced PROMIS outside of the department.” [US Congress, 9/10/1992]

Graham Fuller. [Source: Ohio University]The US tilts ever more sharply towards Iraq in the Iran-Iraq war, even though the Reagan administration continues to maintain a posture of overt neutrality in the conflict. The administration has provided covert military aid for both sides in the struggle (see 1981 and October 1983), and has been divided over which regime to support (see January 14, 1984). It is already involved in “Operation Staunch,” a program designed by Secretary of State George Shultz to stem the flow of weapons to Iran. Now, some officials are arguing that it is time to reverse that course. Graham Fuller, the CIA’s national intelligence officer for the Middle East, writes two controversial secret memos advocating that the administration begin providing support for Iran against Iraq. Fuller is presenting a position long held by national security director Robert McFarlane and two of McFarlane’s aides, Oliver North and Howard Teicher. This pro-Iran group has recently been joined by CIA director William Casey. Both McFarlane and Casey are supportive of Fuller’s memo. Fuller writes in a May 17 memo, “Our tilt to Iraq was timely when Iraq was against the ropes and the Islamic revolution was on a roll. The time may now have to come to tilt back.” Fuller argues that the US should once again authorize Israel to ship US arms to Iran. Ironically, this is the mirror image of Defense Secretary Caspar Weinberger’s argument in favor of supporting Iraq: the US must counter one covert policy with another (see Early 1982). The pro-Iranian coalition within the administration gives scant consideration to the hostage-taking of seven Americans by Hezbollah, a Lebanese Shi’ite militant group with strong ties to Iran’s theocratic regime. On May 20, Fuller circulates a second memo, called a “Special National Intelligence Estimate” (SNIE), that is only read by a handful of senior White House officials (Ronald Reagan is one of the recipients; George Bush is not). Fuller’s memo is written almost entirely for Reagan’s benefit, and in its arguments, becomes a basis for renewed arms sales to Iran and the resulting Iran-Contra scandal. Fuller evokes one of Reagan’s favorite themes, the trouncing of the Soviet Union in the global arena: “We know that the USSR views Iran as ‘the prize’ in the Gulf. Moscow will improve relations when and where it can… until it gains major influence in that state. The disturbing possibility is that the USSR is far more likely than the US to be first in finding opportunities to improve its ties to Iran.” Interestingly, in 1991, during Robert Gates’s Senate hearings on becoming the director of the CIA, it is learned that Fuller’s memo contradicts the views of career Soviet analysts at the agency, who believe that the Soviet Union has no real hope of making inroads into the Iranian regime. The USSR is the chief arms supplier for Iraq, Iran’s bitter enemy and current opponent in a long and bloody war. Iran is arming the Afghan mujaheddin, the Islamist resistance fighters viewed as a threat by Saddam Hussein. Several CIA analysts will later testify that they believe Fuller deliberately slanted his memo for political reasons. In 1992, Fuller himself will admit that he was wrong, but will deny any politicization. Regardless, Fuller’s memo becomes a critical document shaping the Reagan policy to arm Iran. It is not clear whether Vice President Bush ever saw the memo, but whether he did or not, beginning in 1985 he takes part in numerous White House meetings where the arming of Iran is discussed. If he has objections to the policy, he never voices them. [Time, 11/17/1986; New Yorker, 11/2/1992]

Michael Ledeen, a neoconservative author who consults for the National Security Council (see Late 1984), meets informally with Israeli Prime Minister Shimon Peres. Ledeen tells Peres that the Reagan administration will quietly support Israeli arms shipments to Iran. [New York Times, 11/19/1987]

President Reagan places a wreath on a grave at Bitberg Cemetery. [Source: Forward / Getty Images]Ronald Reagan, on a trip to Germany to honor the victims of World War II and the Holocaust, visits the Bergen-Belsen concentration camp. He also visits the Bitberg Cemetery, which contains the graves of Nazi Waffen SS. Some see the Bitberg visit as an indirect expression of Reagan’s support for, or sympathy with, the Nazis. [PBS, 2000]

Reagan officials admit the administration’s policy of sponsoring armed insurgencies against Soviet-backed governments in developing nations. This policy is soon labeled the “Reagan doctrine” (see October 1983) [PBS, 2000] and credited with helping bring about the fall of the Soviet Union. However, author J. Peter Scoblic will later write that the “Reagan doctrine” never really existed.
Aid to Anti-Soviet Insurgencies Far Less than Generally Thought - It is true, he will observe, that the US under President Reagan gave some assistance to countries with popular uprisings against Soviet-backed governments, but only in one—the “geostrategically insignificant” Grenada—did he send American troops to overthrow a Cuban-backed government and install a puppet government favorable to the US. In other countries such as Afghanistan, Nicaragua, Poland, and Angola, the US supported anti-communist or anti-socialist movements by funding and supplying arms to insurgents. But there is far more going on with these countries than conservatives will acknowledge. In Afghanistan, for example, the anti-Soviet mujaheddin were backed not only by the Carter administration, but by Chinese communists who opposed Soviet expansion into Central Asia. And Reagan’s support is, in Scoblic’s words, “equivocal”; by the time Reagan officials admit their administration’s policy of supporting anti-Soviet insurgencies, it has already rolled back many of the Carter-era sanctions against the USSR even though Soviet troops still occupied Afghanistan. In 1981, when the USSR ordered the Polish government to crack down on the labor movement Solidarity, the US did little except briefly impose economic sanctions on high-tech goods. And though many Reagan officials and conservatives outside the administration called for military intervention against Nicaragua’s Sandinista government, the US never sends troops into that country, even though the idea of Soviet expansionism in Central America—the US’s geopolitical “back yard”—is anathema to most Americans. (Reagan once complained to his chief of staff Donald Regan, “Those sons of b_tches [presumably administration hardliners] won’t be happy until we have 25,000 troops in Managua, and I’m not going to do it.” And it was certainly not in line with conservative thought to sell arms to Iran, even if it was to obtain the release of American hostages.
No Actual Analysis of Support Strategies - Reagan’s National Security Adviser, Robert McFarlane, will later say: “Doctrines are things which come from thoughtful analysis of problems, threats, possible ways of dealing with them.… Not one nanosecond went into any [analysis] associated with the support of pro-democracy insurgent elements through the world.” The Reagan administration reacted to events rather than followed thought-out guidelines laying out a plan of action against Soviet expansionism.
Term Created by Neoconservative Columnist - The term “Reagan doctrine” was actually coined in April 1985 by neoconservative columnist Charles Krauthammer, an obdurate advocate of the Nicaraguan Contras and for escalated US support of anti-Soviet insurgencies. He later explained that he “hoped that a ‘doctrine’ enshrining the legitimacy of overthrowing nasty communist governments would obviate the need for rhetorical ruses… and keep the debate—and the administration—honest.” Scoblic will later write, “In other words, he knew that the administration was not naturally inclined to such an aggressive strategy.”
Policies Aligned with Predecessors - The Reagan policies towards the Soviet Union are actually much in line with those of his predecessors, stretching all the way back to Harry Truman, Scoblic will write. [Scoblic, 2008, pp. 145-149]

A University of California, Berkeley graduate student, John E. Hauser, picks up a package in the university’s computer science lab. The package is a bomb made up of ammonium nitrate and aluminum powder. It explodes, costing Hauser four fingers from his right hand and severing arteries. [BBC, 11/12/1987; Washington Post, 4/14/1996; Washington Post, 1998] The bomb has apparently been in the lab for two or three days, left on top of a stack of three-ring binders. Hauser thought it was a file box for another student’s computer cards, and picked it up intending to identify its owner. Upon opening it, he hears an odd buzzing sound, then the bomb detonates. Ironically, the victim of a previous bombing, Professor Diogenes Angelakos (see July 2, 1982), hears the explosion, rushes to offer assistance, and ties a tourniquet around Hauser’s arm. Hauser will lose much of the use of his right arm, and will be forced to abandon his dreams of becoming an Air Force fighter pilot and perhaps an astronaut. He will later say, “There is not a day that goes by when I’m not reminded that I don’t have full use of my right hand… from trying to play racquetball to trying to pick up my daughter.” Of the bombing, Hauser will say, “This was as much a target of opportunity as anything else.” The bombing will later be shown to be the work of Theodore “Ted” Kaczynski, the so-called “Unabomber” (see April 3, 1996). Kaczynski once worked as a professor at UC-Berkeley. Both this bombing and the previous one are in Cory Hall, a building close to where Kaczynski once taught. Captain Bill Foley of the Berkeley campus police will later say: “He taught in Campbell Hall and had offices in one of our temporary buildings. If you did a triangle between Campbell and that temporary building you would hit Cory Hall at peak of the triangle.” Cory Hall also houses the engineering and computer science departments, known to be favorite targets of the Unabomber. [Washington Post, 11/27/1993; Washington Post, 4/14/1996] This bomb is more powerful than earlier Unabomber constructions, using a mix of ammonium nitrate and aluminum powder to cause the explosion. The bomb’s shrapnel consists of tacks, nails, and bits of lead. Stamped on the end seal of the bomb’s pipe are the initials “FC,” which will later be found to stand for “Freedom Club.” [World of Forensic Science, 1/1/2005]

David Jacobsen. [Source: BBC]David Jacobsen, a US citizen and an administrator of Beirut’s American University Hospital, is kidnapped by Hezbollah militants in Lebanon. He will be freed in November 1986. [New York Times, 11/19/1987]

Lewis Tambs becomes the US Ambassador to Costa Rica. Tambs is under orders to open what is called a “southern front” for the Nicaraguan Contras; a small force of Contras is striking into southern Nicaragua from northern Costa Rica, and the Costa Rican government wants them out of their territory. Tambs believes that the orders for the “southern front” come from National Security Council (NSC) officer Oliver North, Assistant Secretary of State Elliott Abrams, and their Restricted Interagency Group (RIG—see Late 1985 and After). Tambs, with the assistance of North’s liaison in Central America, Felix Rodriguez (see Mid-September 1985), secures permission from the Costa Rican government to build an airstrip for use by the Contras in northern Costa Rica, as long as it is not close enough to the border to allow the Contras to use it as a staging area for ground raids. One of Abrams’s first questions to North after being tasked to “monitor” the NSC officer (see September 4, 1985) is why the Costa Ricans are allowing the airstrip. The airstrip will be built at Santa Elena, Costa Rica, by the Udall Corporation, one of the private firms controlled by North’s partner, retired General Richard Secord (see November 19, 1985 and February 2, 1987), and will be called “Point West.” Abrams will later testify, falsely, that no US officials were involved in securing permission to build the airstrip. Notes taken by the US Ambassador to El Salvador, Edwin Corr, about discussions concerning the airstrip, will prove that Abrams lies under oath about the airstrip. [Final Report of the Independent Counsel for Iran/Contra Matters: Chapter 25: United States v. Elliott Abrams: November 1986, 8/4/1993]

The US Congress votes to authorize “non-military” aid to Nicaragua’s Contras: $38 million over two years. [PBS, 2000]

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 (see 1983), to seek Israeli help in freeing the American hostages in Lebanon (see Late 1984 and April 9, 1985), 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.” [CounterPunch, 2/28/2004]

Thomas Sutherland, a US citizen working at Beirut’s American University, is kidnapped by Hezbollah militants in Lebanon. [New York Times, 11/19/1987]

Tensions between the pro-Iran and pro-Iraq factions in the White House (see January 14, 1984) come to a head after Robert McFarlane’s National Security Council staff drafts a presidential directive advocating that the US help Iran obtain weapons. The opposing faction, led by Secretary of State George Shultz and Defense Secretary Caspar Weinberger, protest angrily, with Weinberger calling the proposal “almost too absurd to comment on….” But the arms-for-hostage deal will go forward over Shultz’s and Weinberger’s objections (see July 3, 1985). [New Yorker, 11/2/1992]

A suspicious package mailed to the Auburn, Washington, headquarters of the Boeing Aircraft Company is opened and safely disarmed by the local bomb squad. [BBC, 11/12/1987; Washington Post, 1998] The package containing a pipe bomb gets lost in Boeing’s internal mail system; the package is in the process of being returned to the apparent sender before it draws the attention of Boeing employees, who call the bomb squad. [Washington Post, 4/14/1996] The bomb will later be shown to be the work of Theodore “Ted” Kaczynski, the so-called “Unabomber” (see April 3, 1996). Kaczynski tried to destroy a Boeing aircraft with another bomb six years ago (see November 15, 1979). Like earlier bombs, this bomb contains the initials “FC” engraved on a metal component; authorities will later learn that “FC” stands for “Freedom Club.” [World of Forensic Science, 1/1/2005]

Time magazine cover from June 24, 1985 featuring report on the hijacking of Flight 847. [Source: Time]Islamic militants with the Shi’ite Amal group, an affiliate of Hezbollah, hijack TWA Flight 847 from Athens to Rome. 135 of the 153 passengers are Americans.
Demanding Release of Militant Prisoners - The hijackers demand the immediate release of 17 members of a Shi’ite militant group, Al Dawa, who were arrested in Kuwait for the December 1983 bombing of the American embassy in Kuwait City. (This group, the “Kuwait 17,” features prominently in other hijackers’ demands as well. They will accidentally be released during Iraq’s 1990 invasion of Kuwait.) The hijackers also demand the release of some 700 fellow Shi’ite Muslim prisoners held in Israeli prisons and in prisons in southern Lebanon run by the Israeli-backed South Lebanon Army.
Navy Diver Murdered - The TWA pilot is forced to fly to Beirut, Lebanon, where, after their demands are not met, the hijackers shoot and trample Navy diver Robert Dean Stethem to death and dump his body on the tarmac. The plane is flown to Algiers and then back to Beirut again. Most of the passengers are released, but 39 are held captive in Lebanon. President Reagan holds a press conference largely focusing on the hostage crisis, and says that the US will never give in to terrorist demands.
Hostages Freed - After intervention by Syrian President Hafiz al-Assad, the remaining 39 hostages are freed on June 30 in Damascus; the hijackers are allowed to escape. Some of the hostages later compliment their captors for treating them well during their captivity. Nothing is ever confirmed, but speculation is widespread that some sort of quiet deal between Israel and the hijackers has been struck, as Israel begins releasing Shi’ite prisoners immediately after the hostages’ release. The US will deny that any such deal was ever made. In 1985, four of the hijackers will be indicted for their participation in the TWA takeover, but only one will ever be convicted. [PBS, 2000; PBS Frontline, 10/4/2001; BBC, 2008]

Fawn Hall, the secretary to National Security Council officer Oliver North, asks North if she can borrow money from him. North gives her $60 in traveler’s checks drawn on a Central American bank, and says, as Hall will later testify to Congress (see December 19, 1986): “Make sure you return—pay back the money. It is not mine.” The money is part of the illegal funds raised by North and others for the Nicaraguan Contras. [United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit, 12/13/2007]

The Justice Department makes enhanced PROMIS software available at multiple locations, outside the framework of its contract with Inslaw on the application’s installation and over protests by the company. The software is first installed at 25 US attorneys’ offices in addition to 20 still covered by a contract between Inslaw and the department (see Between August 29, 1983 and February 18, 1985). According to Inslaw’s counsel Elliot Richardson, an enhanced version of the software is then illegally copied to support an additional two sites. Finally, 31 additional sites are brought on line via telecommunications. These additional, smaller US attorneys’ offices had initially been covered by the contract with Inslaw, but this portion of the contract was terminated in 1984 (see February 1984). Inslaw will repeatedly protest about this installation (see March 14, 1986), and a bankruptcy court will find it is in violation of the law (see September 28, 1987), although this ruling will be overturned (see May 7, 1991). [US Congress, 9/10/1992]

Dennis Ryan, 15, helps his father torture and kill a man. Michael Ryan, a partially disabled farmer in Rulo, Nevada, has for three years followed the violent white supremacist teachings of the Posse Comitatus (see 1969) through Posse leader James Wickstrom (see 1975 - 1978), who in 1982 told him to prepare for Armageddon. After speaking to Wickstrom for the first time in Kansas, Ryan told his son to quit playing football and begin practicing with a rifle. Wickstrom adopted Ryan as something of a protege, and steered some of his supporters towards him, making him a leader in local Posse circles. In 1985, Dennis, on his father’s orders, shoots James Thimm in the face. His father had become angry with Thimm. When Thimm does not die, the elder Ryan chains him inside a hog shed, kicks and beats him, and forces him to have sex with a goat. Dennis, again complying with his father’s orders, shoots off Thimm’s fingers and partially skins him. The elder Ryan sodomizes Thimm with a shovel and finally kicks him to death. The entire procedure takes two weeks. In 2001, Dennis Ryan will tell a reporter: “I don’t hold Wickstrom responsible for the crime I committed. I hold him responsible for getting my dad into it.… Wickstrom didn’t make my dad kill anybody, but he planted the seed. He planted it in my dad and then he helped it grow.” Author Daniel Levitas will agree, telling the reporter, “There could not have been the tragedy in Rulo if there was not a James Wickstrom.” Dennis Ryan wil add: “He was looking for something to believe in. He didn’t like blacks to begin with. I don’t think he was ever a popular person growing up. I think that it was the right time for the wrong thing. He was weak and you don’t let someone indoctrinate you into something like that unless you are weak-minded. He was all screwed up.” Former Covenant, Sword and Arm of the Lord member Kerry Noble will say of Wickstrom: “[He] is dangerous to the extent of provoking others. He is typical of leaders. They won’t do violent stuff, yet that’s all they’ll preach. They’ll push buttons, but they are extremely cowardly.” Dennis will recall: “Jim Wickstrom was the reason Dad got into this stuff. He’s the one who showed Dad how to talk to Yahweh, the reason we started getting guns and preparing for Armageddon. He was always so amazed at all the weaponry and how well Jim Wickstrom and his followers in Tigerton Dells (see 1978 - 1983) were armed.” After moving from Whiting, Kansas, to a farm in Rulo, Ryan ordered his family to steal farm equipment, livestock, and weapons in the name of Yahweh. Dennis will recall that the crimes were based on Wickstrom’s teachings, saying: “We were supposed to kill all Satan’s people. Dad was supposed to be the King of Israel and I was the Prince. He was supposed to die before the New Jerusalem was brought down from Yahweh, and then I’d be the king. I believed it 110 percent. All the way. Hell, I helped kill a man for it, and I never once questioned it.… Wickstrom wasn’t physically a constant presence in our lives, he wasn’t over all the time at the house or always on the phone with my dad, but he was there in that he was Dad’s teacher. We had all of his fliers and cassettes. Dad would even listen to Wickstrom while he was taking the garbage out.” Dennis will say that by 1985 Ryan had become obsessed with religious fervor and his conviction that Armageddon was imminent. He became more and more violent, focusing much of his rage on Luke Stice, the five-year-old son of follower Rick Stice, whom he savagely abused until March 1985, when he broke Luke’s neck. Rick Stice helped Ryan bury his child. Dennis will serve a 12-year prison sentence for his role in the death of James Thimm. Michael Ryan will be sentenced to death. Dennis, after serving his sentence, starting a family, and becoming a carpenter, will have no further contact with his father. He has little trust in organized religion. He says: “I look at the Bible and it scares me because I know how people twist it and use it for their own benefit. I don’t want some man up there telling me what God expects of me. I was told that before, and I killed someone.… So many people interpret the Bible so many different ways. I mean, take 9/11. That’s their religious beliefs. They’re no different than what my dad did except they actually carried it out. As far as killing thousands of people—that was his goal, too.” [Southern Poverty Law Center, 12/2004]

Charles Schnabolk. [Source: Institute for Design Professionals]While the Office of Special Planning is still working on its report about the vulnerability of the World Trade Center to terrorist attack, the New York Port Authority hired security consultant Charles Schnabolk to also review the center’s security systems. [UExpress (.com), 10/12/2001; New York County Supreme Court, 1/20/2004] Schnabolk was involved in designing the original security system when the WTC complex was built. [Institue for Design Professionals, 2009; The Security Design Group, 2010] This month his secret report, titled “Terrorism Threat Perspective and Proposed Response for the World Trade Center” is released. It sets out four levels of possible terrorism against the center, and gives examples of each: ”(1) PREDICTABLE—Bomb threats; (2) PROBABLE—Bombing attempts, computer crime; (3) POSSIBLE—Hostage taking; (4) CATASTROPHIC—Aerial bombing, chemical agents in water supply or air conditioning (caused by agents of a foreign government or a programmed suicide).” Similar to other reports in the mid-1980s, it also warns that the WTC “is highly vulnerable through the parking lot.” [UExpress (.com), 10/12/2001; New York County Supreme Court, 1/20/2004]

National Security Council officials, led by NSC Director Robert McFarlane, Deputy Director John Poindexter, and senior NSC official Oliver North, develop a two-part strategy to topple the regime of Libyan dictator Mu’ammar al-Qadhafi. The plan is dubbed “Operation Flower,” with its two components called “Operation Tulip” and “Operation Rose,” respectively. Operation Tulip would be a covert CIA strategy using Libyan exiles to move into Tripoli and overthrow al-Qadhafi in a coup d’etat. Operation Rose proposes a joint US-Egyptian military campaign against the Libyan government. Defense Secretary Caspar Weinberger considers the entire idea “ludicrous,” as do his deputy Richard Armitage and the Joint Chiefs of Staff. However, CIA Director William Casey orders his deputy, Robert Gates, to study the idea. When the CIA produces Gates’s report favoring the idea, the Pentagon develops a military plan deliberately designed to scuttle the idea. The proposed US-Egyptian deployment, the Pentagon strategy says, would require six divisions and 90,000 US troops. Gates says the strategy looks “a lot like the [World War II] invasion of Normandy.” He registers his opposition to such a huge operation, warning that many American citizens as well as US allies would oppose any such overt military campaign. State Department officials concur with Gates’s analysis, and the US ambassador to Egypt, Nick Veliotes, says he believes Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak would want nothing to do with the idea, in part because Mubarak has little confidence in the US military’s willingness to fight for an extended period of time, and so it would leave Egyptian forces to fight alone. Although Poindexter and other NSC officials continue to push the plan, even proposing it to an unimpressed Mubarak, no one else in the Reagan administration supports it, and it is never implemented. [Wills, 2003, pp. 172-175; Foreign Policy, 10/22/2010]

David Kimche. [Source: Mark Leighton / Bettmann / Corbis]David Kimche, the director general of Israel’s Foreign Ministry, meets secretly with National Security Adviser Robert McFarlane to advise him that Israel may be able to use its influence with Iran (see 1981) to engineer the release of American hostages currently held by Hezbollah. Kimche’s outreach is the final piece in the complex arms-for-hostage deal between the US, Israel, and Iran. [New Yorker, 11/2/1992] Israel is a logical conduit for arms to Iran, as it has been selling arms to Iran periodically since 1979, originally as part of its efforts to get Iran to allow Iranian Jews to emigrate to Israel. Like the US, Israel hopes to gain influence with Iranian moderates who will presumably take power after the aged, ailing Islamist radical Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini dies. (Earlier attempts to sell US-made arms to Iran had been blocked by the Carter administration.) According to Israeli sources, this Israeli offer began with a group of Israeli businessmen informing Prime Minister Shimon Peres in early July that they had been in contact with Iranian officials, and thought they could facilitate an arrangement to swap US arms for American hostages. The Israelis say that the US point man for the deal is John Poindexter, the deputy national security adviser, and Poindexter tapped National Security Council aide Oliver North to be the US liaison to Israel. Peres quickly authorized the Israeli businessmen to resume their contacts with the Iranians, and the businessmen contacted Saudi arms merchant Adnan Khashoggi. Khashoggi obtained a long list of desired military equipment from the Iranians, including Hawk antiaircraft missiles and radar-guidance equipment for them, antitank missiles, and spare parts for jet fighters. [Time, 11/17/1986]

After Hezbollah takes two more Americans hostage in Lebanon, Ronald Reagan angrily charges that Iran (the sponsor of Hezbollah) is a member of what he calls a “confederation of terrorist states… a new, international version of Murder Incorporated.” He asserts, “America will never make concessions to terrorists.” But unbeknownst to the public, a group of senior White House officials are working to begin providing military aid to Iran (see May 1985). [New Yorker, 11/2/1992]

While Ronald Reagan publicly compares Iran’s government to “Murder, Incorporated” (see July 8, 1985), he privately authorizes his National Security Adviser, Robert McFarlane, to make contact with Iran. [New York Times, 11/19/1987]

Recovering from cancer surgery, President Reagan authorizes National Security Adviser Robert McFarlane’s plan to open a dialogue with Iran through the auspices of Iranian gunrunner Manucher Ghorbanifar. McFarlane believes the US can win influence with Iranian moderates by helping Iran in its war with Iraq. Reagan believes the thaw in relations may help win the release of US hostages being held in Lebanon by Iranian-backed terrorists. [PBS, 2000]

Director of the Federal Emergency Management Agency Louis O. Giuffrida announces he will step down from his position on September 1. The announcement comes a day before a subcommittee is scheduled to officially approve a report detailing waste, fraud, and abuse at the nation’s disaster agency (see July 25, 1985). Giuffrida is singled out in the report for improperly using agency funds and committing possible perjury, although he says his resignation is unrelated to the subcommittee’s investigation. [Associated Press, 7/26/1985]

Israeli representatives meet with Iranian arms merchant Manucher Ghorbanifar for the first time, to discuss brokering the secret US-Iranian arms deals authorized by President Reagan (see July 18, 1985). Israel will sell arms to Iran, and the US will replenish Israeli stockpiles. [PBS, 2000]

The House Science and Technology Subcommittee on Investigations, chaired by Tennessee Democrat Al Gore, officially approves a report detailing numerous instances of waste, fraud, and abuse at the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA). The 18-month subcommittee investigation finds mismanagement at the highest levels of the agency. The report describes improper awarding of no-bid contracts, the use of agency funds to build luxurious living quarters for FEMA officials, acceptance of gifts by officials from contractors, and questionable payments to contractors. It states that FEMA Director Louis O. Giuffida has used agency funds to pay for first class plane tickets for his wife’s travel. The former third highest-ranking official at FEMA, Fred J. Villella, is accused of using government expenses to upgrade a chapel for his daughter’s wedding. The report says the Triton Corporation, a FEMA contracted company, gave Giuffrida, Villella, and their wives tickets to a $250-a-plate fundraiser held by a private club with ties to the Republican Party. It highlights conflicts in the sworn statements given to the subcommittee by Giuffrida and other agency officials, and recommends the Justice Department review their testimony for possible perjury. [Associated Press, 10/24/1984; Associated Press, 7/26/1985]

Senator Larry Pressler. [Source: Public domain]The US Congress passes the “Pressler Amendment,” requiring the president to certify that Pakistan does not have nuclear weapons every year. The amendment was championed by Senator Larry Pressler (R-SD). If the president does not issue such certification, Pakistan cannot not get any foreign aid from the US. Presidents Reagan and Bush will falsely certify Pakistan does not have nuclear weapons several times (see August 1985-October 1990). Journalist Seymour Hersh will later comment: “There is indisputable evidence that Pakistan has been able to escape public scrutiny for its violations of the law because senior officials of the Reagan and the Bush administrations chose not to share the intelligence about nuclear purchases with Congress. The two Republican administrations obviously feared that the legislators, who had voted for the Solarz (see August 1985) and Pressler Amendments, would cut off funds for the war against the Soviet Union in Afghanistan. It was yet another clash between a much desired foreign-policy goal and the law.” [New Yorker, 3/29/1993]

Congressman Stephen Solarz. [Source: AP]The “Solarz Amendment” to the Foreign Assistance Act is passed by the US Congress and becomes law. The amendment, championed by Congressman Stephen Solarz (D-NY), cuts off all military and economic aid to purportedly non-nuclear nations that illegally export or attempt to export nuclear-related materials from the US. [New Yorker, 3/29/1993] There are subsequently several examples of Pakistan exporting nuclear weapons technology from the US, but they are not punished until the end of the Soviet-Afghan War (see August 1985-October 1990).

Congress modifies the Boland Amendment (see October 10, 1984) by authorizing a one-time appropriation of $27 million for humanitarian aid for the Nicaraguan Contras. On August 29, 1985, President Reagan creates the Nicaraguan Humanitarian Assistance Office (NHAO) in the State Department for the purpose of administering the $27 million. [Final Report of the Independent Counsel for Iran/Contra Matters: Chapter 25: United States v. Elliott Abrams: November 1986, 8/4/1993]

In 1985, US Congress passes legislation requiring US economic sanctions on Pakistan unless the White House can certify that Pakistan has not embarked on a nuclear weapons program (see August 1985 and August 1985). The White House certifies this every year until 1990 (see 1987-1989). However, it is known all the time that Pakistan does have a continuing nuclear program. For instance, in 1983 a State Department memo said Pakistan clearly has a nuclear weapons program that relies on stolen European technology. Pakistan successfully builds a nuclear bomb in 1987 but does not test it to keep it a secret (see 1987). With the Soviet-Afghan war ending in 1989, the US no longer relies on Pakistan to contain the Soviet Union. So in 1990 the Pakistani nuclear program is finally recognized and sweeping sanctions are applied (see June 1989). [Gannon, 2005] Journalist Seymour Hersh will comment, “The certification process became farcical in the last years of the Reagan Administration, whose yearly certification—despite explicit American intelligence about Pakistan’s nuclear-weapons program—was seen as little more than a payoff to the Pakistani leadership for its support in Afghanistan.” [New Yorker, 3/29/1993] The government of Pakistan will keep their nuclear program a secret until they successfully test a nuclear weapon in 1998 (see May 28, 1998).

A major meeting to codify the arms-for-hostage deal with Iran takes place in Ronald Reagan’s private White House quarters, after Iranian officials sent requests to open negotiations with the US through backchannel sources. Reagan, recovering from intestinal surgery and wearing pajamas and a bathrobe, is joined by Vice President Bush, Secretary of State George Shultz, Defense Secretary Caspar Weinberger, White House chief of staff Donald Regan, and National Security Adviser Robert McFarlane. McFarlane, passing along information he has received from Israel (see 1981), says the Iranians will see to it that Hezbollah releases four American hostages in return for US and Israeli arms. McFarlane has long supported arms sales to Iran, and is most supportive of the deal; Weinberger and Shultz, who support dealing with Iraq, are firmly against it. But the deal will go through (see September 15, 1985). [Time, 11/17/1986; New Yorker, 11/2/1992]

Israel sends 96 TOW anti-tank missiles to Iran (see May 3, 1985). [New York Times, 11/19/1987] No American hostages are freed in return. [PBS, 2000]

Neoconservative author and likely Israeli spy Michael Ledeen (see April 9, 1985), a consultant for the National Security Council (see Late 1984), has his security clearance downgraded by the Department of Defense. Ledeen formerly held “Top Secret-SCI” clearance; he now holds only “Secret” clearance. [CounterPunch, 2/28/2004]

Steven Calabresi joins the Justice Department. Calabresi is a young conservative lawyer who has clerked for appeals court Robert Bork, who failed to secure a position on the Supreme Court just months before (see July 1-October 23, 1987). Calabresi, a co-founder of the Federalist Society of conservative lawyers and judges, joins forces with another ambitious young Justice Department lawyer, John Harrison, and the two begin working to expand the power of the president. Calabresi and Harrison decide that an aggressive use of presidential signing statements can advance the president’s authority to the detriment of the legislative and judicial branches. Unfazed by a recent judicial rejection of just such signing statement usage (see 1984-1985), Calabresi and Harrison write a memo to Attorney General Edwin Meese advocating the issuing of more signing statements as part of a larger strategy to increase the president’s influence over the law. Calabresi and Harrison are interested in how what they call “activist judges” use the legislative history of a bill that became law to interpret that law’s meaning in subsequent judicial actions. The two lawyers believe that by issuing signing statements, the president can create a parallel record of presidential interpretations of potentially ambiguous laws to help guide judicial decisions. Meese approves of the idea, and in December has the West Publishing Company, which prints the US Code Congressional and Administration News, the standard collection of bills’ legislative history, begin including presidential signing statements in its publications. In 2007, author Charlie Savage will call Meese’s move “a major step in increasing the perceived legitimacy of the device.” [Savage, 2007, pp. 232] In 2007, Calabresi will say: “I initially thought of signing statements as presidential legislative history. I’ve subsequently come to think of them as being important vehicles by which presidents can control subordinates in the executive branch. They subsequently came to be important to the unitary executive [theory of presidential power].” [Savage, 2007, pp. 234]

Valerie Plame, the 22-year old daughter of a military family that followed its Air Force father around the globe during her childhood, joins the CIA. She is one of only 250 or so recruits accepted in the elite Career Trainee Program, a relatively new program installed by CIA Director William Casey and future director Robert Gates. These recruits receive intensive training in everything from academics, government and political structures, and paramilitary operations. Plame is one of the first women accepted in the program. She acquits herself very well in training, winning the respect of her fellow recruits. Classmate Larry Johnson, who will himself go on to a long career in the agency, will later recall of the young woman he knows only as “Val P.”: “She didn’t try to pretend to be something that she was not. She didn’t shoot her mouth off. Looking back, for her age, how so damn young she was, she was remarkably mature, and very serious. It was clear she wanted to be taken seriously.” Only three recruits from the “survivors” of the original class of 250 will go on to work as NOCs—nonofficial covered officers. Plame will be one of those three. [Wilson, 2007, pp. 315-317]

Al Mohamed, pictured in a US army video. [Source: US Army]The CIA claims to have put Ali Mohamed on a terrorist watch list to prevent him from coming to the US (see 1984). Somehow, Mohamed gets a US visa anyway. After learning that he has been given a visa, the CIA supposedly issues a warning to other Federal agencies that a suspicious character might be traveling to the US. Mohamed is able to move to the US nonetheless. [New York Times, 12/1/1998; San Francisco Chronicle, 11/4/2001] The State Department will not explain how he is able to move to the US despite such warnings. [New York Times, 12/1/1998] In 1995, after Mohamed’s name publicly surfaces at the trial of Sheikh Omar Abdul-Rahman, the Boston Globe will report that Mohamed had been admitted to the US under a special visa program controlled by the CIA’s clandestine service. This will contradict the CIA’s later claims of disassociating themselves from Mohamed and attempting to stop him from entering the US. [Boston Globe, 2/3/1995; New York Times, 10/30/1998] Mohamed befriends an American woman he meets on the airplane flight to the US. They get married less than two months later, and he moves to her residence in Santa Clara, California. The marriage will help him to become a US citizen in 1989. [San Francisco Chronicle, 9/21/2001]

Despite the passage of two amendments dealing with Pakistan’s nuclear program in August 1985 (see August 1985 and August 1985), the Reagan and Bush administrations will fail to keep Congress properly informed of incidents related to Pakistan’s acquisition of components for its nuclear program, even though such notification is required by law. Senator John Glenn (D-OH), chairman of the Governmental Affairs Committee, and Congressman Stephen Solarz (D-NY), Chairman of the House Asian and Pacific Affairs Subcommittee, will later say that they are not formally briefed about any significant Pakistani procurement, with the exception of one case (see July 1987 or Shortly After), during this period. For example, Glenn will later say he should have been briefed about a nuclear scare involving Pakistan and India in 1990 (see January-May 1990) [New Yorker, 3/29/1993]

Former National Security Adviser Robert McFarlane, an emissary of the Reagan administration, takes 23 tons of weapons to Iran. [PBS, 2000]

Newly ensconsced Assistant Secretary of State Elliott Abrams (see April 19, 1985 and After) meets with Secretary of State George Shultz, Shultz’s executive assistant Charles Hill, and Shultz’s executive secretary Nicholas Platt. In this meeting, Abrams learns that National Security Council official Oliver North is conducting covert actions to support the Nicaraguan Contras (see December 6, 1985 and April 4, 1986). According to Abrams’s notes from the meeting, Shultz tasks him to “monitor Ollie.” Abrams will later testify to the Iran-Contra investigative committee (see May 5, 1987) about this meeting, saying that he asks, “All these accusations about Colonel North, you want me to try to find out whether they are true and what he is up to, or do you want me to sort of leave?” Shultz replies, “No, you have got to know.” During the meeting, Abrams notes that Shultz does not want White House officials to know too much about North’s activities in funding the Contras. Abrams notes that Shultz says to him: “We don’t want to be in the dark. You [are] suppose[d] to be mgr [manager] of overall CA [Central America] picture. Contras are integral part of it. So y[ou] need to know how they [are] getting arms. So don’t just say go see the WH [White House]. It’s very risky for WH.” Platt, too, takes notes of the meeting. According to his notes, Shultz says: “What is happening on other support for Contras for lethal aid etc.—E. Abrams doesn’t have the answer. Stayed away let Ollie North do it. Fundraising continuing—weapons stocks are high. We have had nothing to do with private aid. Should we continue? Hate to be in position, [Shultz] says, of not knowing what’s going on. You are supposed to be managing overall Central American picture. Ollie can go on doing his thing, but you, [Abrams], should know what’s happening.” The notes from Abrams and Platt, and Abrams’s own testimony all confirm that Abrams is aware of North’s activities by September 1985, though he will subsequently lie to Congress about possessing such knowledge (see November 25-28, 1986). Abrams will later testifz that he has a very good idea about North’s activities from working with North in an interagency group (see Late 1985 and After). [Final Report of the Independent Counsel for Iran/Contra Matters: Chapter 25: United States v. Elliott Abrams: November 1986, 8/4/1993]

Inslaw complains about additional installations of enhanced PROMIS software by the Justice Department. Inslaw and the department had a contract for the company to install the software in 20 large US attorneys’ offices and then dozens of smaller ones (see March 1982), but the portion of the contract for the smaller offices was terminated (see February 1984), and the department is installing an enhanced version of the software Inslaw says it owns in these smaller offices (see Between June 24, 1985 and September 2, 1987). The complaint is made in a letter by Inslaw president William Hamilton to H. Lawrence Wallace, the assistant attorney general for administration. “I am extremely disturbed and disappointed to learn that the Executive Office for US Attorneys has begun to manufacture copies of the PROMIS software for customization and installation in additional US attorneys offices, specifically those in St. Louis, Missouri, and Sacramento, California,” Hamilton writes. “This action occurs at the very time that the Department of Justice and Inslaw are attempting to resolve, by negotiation, Inslaw’s claim that the US attorneys version of PROMIS contains millions of dollars of privately-financed enhancements that are proprietary products of Inslaw and for which Inslaw has, to date, received no compensation.” [US Congress, 9/10/1992]

The trial of 21 members of the white supremacist group The Order begins in a US district court in western Washington State (see Late December 1984 - April 1985). The trial judge is Walter T. McGovern. Eleven of the defendants decide to plead guilty and several agree to serve as government witnesses. The trial lasts into December 1985; 338 witnesses testify, and over 1,500 exhibits are presented. The defense attempts to discredit the Order members who turn state’s evidence, accusing them of creating a “self-serving fabric of lies,” and the prosecution of “trial by gossip.” Jurors will later tell news reporters that the most compelling evidence in the trial comes from the former Order members. The jury, composed of eight white women and four white men, deliberates for two weeks before issuing its verdict on December 30. All 10 defendants are found guilty of racketeering and conspiracy. Six are found guilty of other federal crimes. Judge McGovern will hand down stern sentences, ranging from 40 to 100 years in federal detention. [HistoryLink, 12/6/2006] Many of those convicted will remain unrepentant during their prison stays, and are viewed by radical right-wing extremists as “prisoners of war” and “heroes.” [Eye on Hate, 2003] Two other Order members, David Tate (see April 15, 1985) and Richard Scutari (see March 19, 1986), escape the Washington prosecution.

Benjamin Weir. [Source: Santa Clara University]The first arms-for-hostage deal between Iran and the US is completed (see August 6, 1985). On August 30, Israel sold over 500 US-made TOW anti-tank missiles to Iran. Now Iran frees the Reverend Benjamin Weir, an American kidnapped over a year before in Lebanon. White House officials hope for further hostage releases, but none are forthcoming. [New Yorker, 11/2/1992] Ronald Reagan will telephone Israeli Prime Minister Shimon Peres to thank him for Israel’s help in securing Weir’s freedom. The TOW missiles will be delivered to Iran on September 20, in the cargo hold of a DC-8 transport plane once owned by a Miami-based air transport company; the aircraft took off from Tabriz, Iran, disappeared from radar screens over Turkey, made what was supposed to be a “forced landing” in Israel and later returned to Iran by a circuitous route. [Time, 11/17/1986]

The National Security Council’s Oliver North persuades former CIA officer Felix Rodriguez to help him divert funds and weapons to the Nicaraguan Contras (see December 6, 1985 and April 4, 1986). Rodriguez agrees to set up the servicing of CIA transport planes and other aircraft at the Ilopango Air Base in San Salvador, El Salvador. Rodriguez works out of Ilopango, helping the Salvadoran Air Force in its own counter-insurgency activities. Rodriguez was placed at Ilopango by Donald Gregg, a former CIA agent who now serves as the foreign policy adviser to Vice President Bush (see March 17, 1983). While in El Salvador, Rodriguez uses the alias “Max Gomez.” [Final Report of the Independent Counsel for Iran/Contra Matters: Chapter 25: United States v. Elliott Abrams: November 1986, 8/4/1993]

President Ronald Reagan signs a directive that contributes to the modern era of “continuity planning,” which will ensure the maintenance of a functioning government in the event of a catastrophic attack on Washington, DC. This Continuity of Government (COG) plan will be activated for the first time on 9/11, in response to the terrorist attacks that day (see (Between 9:45 a.m. and 9:56 a.m.) September 11, 2001). [Washington Post, 3/1/2002; ABC News, 4/25/2004] National Security Decision Directive 188 (NSDD 188), “Government Coordination for National Security Emergency Preparedness,” states that it is the policy of the United States to have capabilities at all levels of government to respond to a range of national security emergencies, “from major natural calamities to hostile attacks on the nation.” The US policy “includes an emergency mobilization preparedness program which provides an effective capability to meet defense and essential civilian needs during those emergencies.” The National Security Council (NSC) is assigned as the “principal forum” where the national security emergency preparedness policy will be considered, and the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) is to “assist in the implementation of this policy through a coordinating role with the other federal agencies.” NSDD 188 also assigns responsibility for continuity planning to an interagency panel that includes the Office of Management and Budget, and the Defense, Treasury, and Justice Departments. [US President, 9/16/1985; Washington Post, 3/1/2002] A subsequent executive order in 1988 will apply the COG plan to “any national security emergency situation that might confront the nation” (see November 18, 1988), and a presidential directive in 1998 will update it to specifically deal with the emerging threat posed by terrorists (see Early 1998 and October 21, 1998). [US President, 11/18/1988; Clarke, 2004, pp. 166-167 and 170; Washington Post, 6/4/2006]

Ralph Tarr, the acting head of the Justice Department’s Office of Legal Counsel, drafts a memo explaining how the White House has issued signing statements up until now (see August 23, 1985 - December 1985), and makes recommendations on how to improve the process. Tarr, acting at the behest of an aide to Attorney General Edwin Meese, issues what author Charlie Savage will call “a prescient seven-page manifesto.” Tarr writes that signing statements are “presently underutilized and could become far more important as a tool of presidential management of the agencies, a device for preserving issues of importance in the ongoing struggle for power with Congress, and an aid to statutory interpretation for the courts.” Tarr writes that signing statements have the potential to be used as a threat “with which to negotiate concessions from Congress.” The statements can also be used to tell executive branch agencies how to interpret a law: “The president can direct agencies to ignore unconstitutional provisions or to read provisions in a way that eliminates constitutional or policy problems. This direction permits the president to seize the initiative in creating what will eventually be the agency’s interpretation.” [Savage, 2007, pp. 232-233]

The first meeting of the State Department’s Nicaraguan Humanitarian Assistance Office (NHAO) is held. Two aides to Assistant Secretary of State Elliott Abrams (see April 19, 1985 and After and September 4, 1985) attend the meeting. During the meeting, National Security Council (NSC) officer Oliver North offers the services of former CIA agent Felix Rodriguez to assist in distributing the $27 million in humanitarian aid recently approved for the Contras (see August 1985). Rodriguez is helping North channel illegal funds to the Contras (see Mid-September 1985). The agreement is to channel the funds to the Contras through El Salvador’s Ilopango Air Base, Rodriguez’s center of operations. By early 1986, the legal NHAO fund distribution will merge with the illegal North fund distribution (see December 6, 1985 and April 4, 1986). [Final Report of the Independent Counsel for Iran/Contra Matters: Chapter 25: United States v. Elliott Abrams: November 1986, 8/4/1993] Some of the $27 million is never used for humanitarian purposes, but instead used to buy weapons, both for the Contras and for the mujaheddin in Afghanistan. [Spartacus Schoolnet, 12/28/2007]

Rock Hudson shortly before his death. [Source: Southern Voice]Actor Rock Hudson, a close friend of Ronald and Nancy Reagan, dies of Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome (AIDS). The virus was identified in 1983, but until now has been ignored by the Reagan administration. With the death of Hudson, Reagan will call AIDS research a “top priority” for his administration. However, Reagan immediately proposes spending cuts that would slash funding for such research. [PBS, 2000]

National Security Adviser Robert McFarlane, speaking for the Reagan administration, proposes a new, “broad” interpretation of the US-Soviet Anti-Ballistic Missile (ABM) Treaty (see May 26, 1972) on national television. McFarlane proposes that space-based and mobile systems and components based on “other physical principles,” i.e. lasers, particle beams, etc., should be developed and tested, but not deployed. (The traditional, “narrow” interpretation of the treaty is more restrictive.) Days later, President Reagan announces that while he and his administration support this “broad” interpretation, as a matter of national policy, the US’s Strategic Defense Initiative (see March 23, 1983) will continue to observe the more traditional interpretation. [Federation of American Scientists, 1/15/2008]

The US ships another 500 TOW anti-tank missiles to Iran via Israel. [PBS, 2000]

After assessing the security of New York Port Authority facilities, the Office of Special Planning (OSP), the Port Authority’s own antiterrorist task force, releases a report called “Counter-Terrorism Perspectives: The World Trade Center.” For security purposes, only seven copies are made, being hand-delivered and signed for by its various recipients, including the executive director of the Port Authority, the superintendent of the Port Authority Police, and the director of the World Trade Department. [New York Court of Appeals, 2/16/1999; Village Voice, 1/5/2000] Because of the WTC’s visibility, symbolic value, and it being immediately recognizable to people from around the world, the report concludes that the center is a “most attractive terrorist target.” [New York County Supreme Court, 1/20/2004] The report, which is 120 pages long, lists various possible methods of attacking the center. [New York Court of Appeals, 2/16/1999; Caram, 2001, pp. 103; Barrett and Collins, 2006, pp. 87] One of these is that a “time bomb-laden vehicle could be driven into the WTC and parked in the public parking area.… At a predetermined time, the bomb could be exploded in the basement.” [Glanz and Lipton, 2004, pp. 227] As a Senate Committee Report will find in August 1993, “The specifics of the February 26, 1993 bombing at the World Trade Center garage were almost identical to those envisioned in the [OSP] report.” [New York Court of Appeals, 2/16/1999] Due to the Port Authority’s failure to adequately implement the OSP’s recommendations, the report will be crucial evidence in a successful civil trial against it in October 2005, charging negligence in failing to prevent the 1993 bombing. [Bloomberg, 10/26/2005; New York Times, 10/27/2005; New York Times, 2/18/2006] As of mid-2006, the other possible methods of attacking the WTC listed in the report remain undisclosed.

Days before President Reagan’s scheduled Geneva summit with Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev (see November 16-19, 1985), Defense Secretary Caspar Weinberger attempts to sabotage the meeting by leaking to the press a letter he had recently written to Reagan outlining what he called systematic Soviet violations of existing arms treaties, and warning Reagan that if he makes any deal with Gorbachev, he implicitly accepts those infractions. Author J. Peter Scoblic will call it “a clumsy attempt to undermine the talks,” and one that angers the more moderate administration officials. Instead of undermining the negotiations as he had intended, Reagan takes Weinberger off the Geneva delegation. [Scoblic, 2008, pp. 143]

The Justice Department makes a counterproposal in the dispute with Inslaw over rights to an enhanced version of the PROMIS software. The principles of the settlement, set out by the Justice Management Division’s general counsel Janice A. Sposato in a letter to Inslaw lawyer Harvey Sherzer, are:
The department will not pay Inslaw any additional money for the enhanced software obtained under a contract on implementation of PROMIS at US attorneys’ offices;
Inslaw will recognize that the US government has the right to unrestricted use of the enhanced software obtained under the contract for any federal project, including projects implemented by independent contractors;
The department will agree not to make or permit any disclosure or distribution of the software other than as described above, or as required by federal law.
Inslaw will not accept the counterproposal, and the dispute will continue. [US Congress, 9/10/1992]

In Ann Arbor, Michigan, research assistant Nicklaus Suino of the University of Michigan suffers burns and shrapnel wounds when he opens a package bomb at the home of psychology professor James V. McConnell. [BBC, 11/12/1987; Washington Post, 1998] The bombing will later be shown to be the work of Theodore “Ted” Kaczynski, the so-called “Unabomber” (see April 3, 1996). McConnell may be one of Kaczynski’s most personal targets. McConnell is a rich, flamboyant, and somewhat eccentric professor who espouses controversial theories about human behavior modification based on his research with flatworms. McConnell taught at the University of Michigan when Kaczynski was taking graduate courses in mathematics there. The package mailed to McConnell’s house comes with a one-page letter taped to the top, bearing a Salt Lake City postmark and reading in part: “I’d like you to read this book. Everybody in your position should read this book.” McConnell asks Suino to open it. The resulting explosion injures Suino; McConnell escapes with slight, temporary hearing loss but is profoundly shaken by the incident. [Washington Post, 4/14/1996]

Reagan and Gorbachev at the Geneva summit meeting. [Source: Ronald Reagan Library]The long-awaited summit meeting between President Ronald Reagan and Soviet Premier Mikhail Gorbachev takes place in Geneva. The meeting, later known as the “fireside summit,” comes after months of Gorbachev’s reforms in the USSR—“glasnost,” or openness to government transparency; “perestroika,” a retooling of the moribund Stalinist economy; and a dogged anti-alcohol campaign, among others. Gorbachev has packed the Kremlin with officials such as new Foreign Minister Edvard Shevardnadze and chief economist Alexander Yakovlev, who back his reform campaigns. (Yakolev has even proposed democratization of the Soviet Communist Party.) Reagan and Gorbachev have exchanged several letters which have helped build relations between the two leaders. Reagan, unlike some of his hardline advisers, is excited about the summit, and has diligently prepared, even holding mock debates with National Security Council member Jack Matlock playing Gorbachev. Reagan has also quietly arranged—without the knowledge of his recalcitrant hardline advisers—for an extension of the scheduled 15-minute private meeting between himself and Gorbachev. The two actually talk for five hours. Nothing firm is agreed upon during this first meeting, but as Reagan later recalls, it marks a “fresh start” in US-Soviet relations. Gorbachev returns to the USSR promoting his and Reagan’s agreement on the need to reduce nuclear arms; Reagan presents the summit as a “victory” in which he did not back down to Soviet pressure, but instead emphasized the need for the Soviets to honor basic human rights for their citizens. Gorbachev realizes that Reagan’s abhorrence of nuclear weapons and his desire for a reduction in nuclear arms (see April 1981 and After) is personal and not shared by many of his administration’s officials, much less the US defense industry. As a result, he focuses on personal contacts and appeals to Reagan, and puts less stock in formal negotiations between the two. [National Security Archive, 11/22/2005; Scoblic, 2008, pp. 139-140; Margaret Thatcher Foundation, 1/23/2008]

Lieutenant Colonel Oliver North, a mid-level National Security Council staff member, is put in charge of the upcoming shipment of US Hawk anti-aircraft missiles to Iran (see November 24-25, 1985). [PBS, 2000]

Retired Air Force Major General Richard Secord becomes deeply involved in organizing a covert supply operation for Nicaragua’s Contras under the name “Airlift Project.” Secord later testifies to the Congressional Iran-Contra Committee that the project’s money comes from private donations and friendly foreign governments. [New York Times, 11/19/1987]

The CIA arranges for the shipment of 18 Hawk anti-aircraft missiles from Israel to Iran, ferried aboard a CIA front company transport plane. Within days, the Iranians reject the missiles because they do not meet their requirements. Some of the US officials involved in the missile transfer later claim they believe the CIA plane carried oil-drilling parts, and not weapons. After the transfer, John McMahon, the deputy director of the CIA, says that the agency can no longer provide covert assistance to Iran without explicit authorization from President Reagan. [New York Times, 11/19/1987] Reagan will authorize the sale of the missiles a month later (see December 5, 1985).

Officials from the National Program Office (NPO), responsible for the highly classified Continuity of Government program, fake an exercise in front of congressional leaders in order to cover up equipment failures. At a secret site near Great Falls, Montana, Speaker of the House Tip O’Neill (D-MA) and Senate Appropriations Committee Chairman Robert Byrd (D-WV) gather with other key officials to witness the first major test of a new post-nuclear communication system. The high-tech system, worth millions of dollars, is meant to provide government leaders with the ability to communicate during and after a nuclear war. Much of the equipment, however, was purchased from separate contractors and is technically incompatible. The multi-million dollar system does not function properly, but NPO officials rig the exercise, paving the way for additional funding. As one participant will later explain: “At one point information was supposed to be sent out, and even though lights were blinking and the wheels were turning, the message was being sent by payphone about a block and a half from the site where the exercise was taking place.… Millions of dollars worth of equipment failed to function correctly and 25 or 50 cents worth of change and a pay telephone got the message through.” The visiting congressmen, who are responsible for allocating funds for the project, are fooled into thinking the system is fully functional. Money will continue to flow into the shoddy equipment for years to come. Sources will tell CNN five years later that the system is still not working properly. “Very few people knew about the scam and because the program is so classified there was no one they could tell,” CNN will report in 1991. [CNN Special Assignment, 11/17/1991]

Aryan Nations (see Early 1970s) security chief Elden “Bud” Cutler is arrested in Coeur d’Alene, Idaho, for trying to hire a hit man to kill an FBI informant in an investigation into the organization known as The Order (see Late December 1984 - April 1985). [Southern Poverty Law Center, 2010]

Assistant Secretary of State Elliott Abrams (see April 19, 1985 and After) joins the National Security Council (NSC)‘s Oliver North and the CIA’s Central American Task Force chief Alan Fiers as the principal members of a Restricted Interagency Group (RIG) which works on Central American affairs for the Reagan administration. Abrams, a staunch supporter of Nicaragua’s Contras, becomes aware of North’s machinations to divert US funds to the Contras (see December 6, 1985 and April 4, 1986) in spite of Congress’s prohibition on such funding (see October 10, 1984). Abrams will also become directly involved in secret, illegal efforts to secure funding for the Contras from other nations (see June 11, 1986). [Final Report of the Independent Counsel for Iran/Contra Matters: Chapter 25: United States v. Elliott Abrams: November 1986, 8/4/1993]