Not Sold On Gates

Robert Parry, who really knows his 1980s government scandals, has some outstanding questions:

What is clear is that after Ronald Reagan took office and sent his campaign chief William Casey over to run the CIA in 1981, Gates’s career took off. Casey, who also was implicated in the October Surprise controversy, elevated Gates to be the assistant director for intelligence analysis and then to be deputy CIA director.

Later, Gates was linked to both the Iran-Contra scandal, which involved the trading of arms for hostages with Iran, and the Iraqgate controversy, the clandestine military support given to Iraq’s Saddam Hussein during his eight-year war with Iran.

So Gates is tied to not one, not two, but three major scandals of the Reagan era. It's worth noting that another expert on Iran-Contra, Thomas Blanton, has called Gates “the ultimate hear-no-evil see-no-evil high official during Iran-Contra.” Some of Gates's statements about his involvement are difficult to fathom. If his boss at the CIA at the time was anyone other than the paranoid and manipulative William Casey, you'd have to say Gates was DEFINITELY lying when he denied knowledge of a diversion of profits to the Contras from arms sales to Iran... and that's being charitable. So we have a liar for Secretary of Defense. But hey, the government is full of liars! The real question is how sincerely they've committed to atonement.