I was doing a little research on Robert Gates, the nominee to replace Donald Rumsfeld, when I came across an excellent Washington Post article from September 19, 1991. The article was written by Marjorie Williams and it appeared during the hearings for Gates’s confirmation as DCI. For those of you that are interested, you can read about Gates’s role in Iran-Contra in the Walsh Reports’ chapter on the subject.
Williams used the opportunity of the hearing to delve deeply into what the Iran-Contra Affair meant and why it unfolded and turned out as it did. I often had a problem with William’s work, but this article strikes me as one of the best I ever read on Iran-Contra. It’s really worth a read on a Friday night, so I recommend it.
One graf from the article kind of sums things up nicely.
We never decided what Iran-contra was, or why it mattered; whether it was a national disgrace, a set of discreet crimes, a policy struggle or a constitutional crisis. “There is no official reality of Iran-contra,” in the sardonic words of one Democratic hill aide, “other than, ‘the Democrats screwed it up.’ “
We did screw it up. Properly handled, it would have precluded Ronald Reagan going down in history as a great president worthy of having airports named after him. It would have precluded people like Poindexter, Gates, Powell, Abrams, and others from rising back from the dead to lead us into another foreign policy disaster.
We need to remember that lesson as we try to grapple with the current administration. All of the key players should be disqualif[ied] to hold and enjoy any Office of honor, Trust or Profit under the United States, from here on out.