George Bush: The Unauthorized Biography - Get a Free Blog

December 1985:
Congress passed new laws limiting U.S. aid to the Contras. The CIA, the Defense
Department, and `` any other agency or entity of the United States involved in
intelligence activities '' were prohibited from providing armaments to the Contras. The
CIA was permitted to provide communications equipment and training. `` Humanitarian ''
aid was allowed. These laws, known together as `` Boland III, '' were in effect from
December 4, 1985 to October 17, 1986.
December 18, 1985:
CIA official Charles E. Allen, a member of George Bush's Terrorism Task Force, wrote
an update on the arms-for-hostages dealings with Iran. Allen's memo was a debriefing of
an unnamed member of the group of U.S. government officials participating in the arms
negotiations with the Iranians. The unnamed U.S. official (from the context, probably
NSC terrorism consultant Michael Ledeen) is referred to in Allen's memo as `` Subject ''.
Allen wrote: `` [Speaker of the Iranian Parliament Hashemi] Rafsanjani ... believes Vice
President George Bush is orchestrating the U.S. initiative with Iran. In fact, according to
Subject, Rafsanjani believes that Bush is the most powerful man in the U.S. because in
addition to being Vice President, he was once Director of CIA. ''@s3@s2
December 1985-January 1986:
George Bush completed his official study of terrorism in December 1985. John
Poindexter now directed Oliver North to go back to work with Amiram Nir. Amiram Nir
came to Washington and met with Oliver North. He told U.S. officials that the Iranians
had promised to free all hostages in exchange for more arms. Reportedly after this Nir
visit, in an atmosphere of constant terrorism and rumors of terrorism, President Reagan
was persuaded of the necessity of revving up the arms shipments to Iran.@s3@s3
December 27, 1985:
Terrorists bombed Rome and Vienna airports, killing 20 people, including five
Americans. The Crisis Pre-Planning Group (CPPG), supervised by Bush's office and
reporting to Bush, blamed Libyans for the attack and began planning for a military strike
on Libya. Yet an unpublished CIA analysis and the Israelis both acknowledged that the
Abu Nidal group (in effect, the Israeli Mossad agency) carried out the attacks.@s3@s4
Bush's CPPG later organized the U.S. bombing of Libya, which occurred in mid-April
1986.
December 31, 1985 (Tuesday):
Iranian arms dealer Cyrus Hashemi told Paris-based CIA agent Bernard Veillot that Vice
President Bush was backing arms sales to Iran, and that official U.S. approval for private