iran contra affair. To free some Americans being held hostage by terrorists in Lebanon, the United States engaged in a covert arms deal known as the Iran-Contra Affair, in which missiles and other armaments were traded for the hostages. The controversial dealand the ensuing political scandalthreatened to bring down the presidency of Ronald Reagan.
Reagan’s Policy Directives
The political climate of the early 1980s may have prevented the Iran-Contra Affair, also known as the Iran-Contra Scandal and Irangate.
President Ronald Reagan, who won the White House in 1980, wasnt able to maintain the political momentum for his Republican colleagues, and the GOP was swept from the majority in both the Senate and House of Representatives in the 1982 mid-term elections.
The president’s plans would be complicated as a result. During his campaign for the White House, Reagan had promised to assist anti-Communist insurgencies around the globe, but the so-called Reagan Doctrine faced a political hurdle following those mid-term elections.
Sandinistas in Nicaragua
Soon after taking control of Congress, the Democrats passed the Boland Amendment, which restricted the activities of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) and Department of Defense (DoD) in foreign conflicts.
