Iran-Contra

Missiles, hostages, and cocaine-adjacent airstrips — run from a White House basement.

The confirmed architecture: missiles to Iran via Israel despite the embargo, proceeds diverted to the Contras despite the Boland Amendment, run from the NSC basement by Oliver North with document shredding performed as testimony. Fourteen indicted; six pardoned by Bush on Christmas Eve 1992, including Weinberger before trial. The unresolved annex is the cocaine question: the Kerry Committee found Contra-connected trafficking the DEA had flagged, and Gary Webb's 'Dark Alliance' series — professionally fatal for Webb — forced a CIA Inspector General report that conceded more than its press coverage did. Connects the black budget, BCCI's laundry, and the body-count genre's favorite decade.