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Selects: Iran-Contra Affair: Shady in the 80s, Part 2
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The Shredding Party and Choosing the Fall Guy
At 36:53 · chapter starts 36:10
When it became clear the scandal could no longer be contained, Oliver North and his famously big-haired secretary Fawn Hall held what became known as the 'shredding party,' destroying a full day's worth of documents. [1] — Chuck Bryant "When the scandal broke, Oliver North and his secretary Fawn Hall conducted what became known as a 'shredding party,' destroying a day's wor…" 36:35 Whatever evidence they destroyed is gone permanently, and the full truth may never be known. The Reagan administration then crafted its official narrative: Poindexter had acted on his understanding of what Reagan wanted and tapped North; North went rogue and created the entire network — the Contra supply chain, the Swiss accounts, the Iranian arms deal — essentially on his own, without Reagan or Bush knowing anything. The buck stopped at Poindexter. The American public greeted this story with deep skepticism, and North himself, when testifying before Congress in his dress uniform, declined to explicitly exonerate the president while suggesting he believed Reagan was fully aware.
When the scandal broke, Oliver North and his secretary Fawn Hall conducted what became known as a 'shredding party,' destroying a day's worth of documents. The full truth of Iran-Contra may never be known because of what was fed through that shredder.
The official narrative: John Poindexter wanted to help the Contras, tapped Oliver North, and North went rogue — creating the entire network, brokering the Iran deal, all without Reagan or Bush knowing anything. The American public was not impressed.
