OUT WITH THE OLD BOSS SAME AS THE OLD BOSS

"According to former CIA officer: Gates gave "falsified reports and uncoordinated analysis" to the President of the United States. Bush selects Gates to replace a Defense Secretary who did the same thing."

Like outgoing S.O.D. Rumsfeld, S.O.D. nominee Robert Gates is a longstanding Operative of the Bush Regime. When I heard the name, I just knew he had to be part of the Secret Government. I just couldn't remember the particulars. Being at home w/out access to the 'net I was frustrated. When I want to see where the trail leads, I often go to Wayne Madsen Reports. I was not dissapointed.

"November 9, 2006 -- Defense Secretary-designate Robert Gates in position to know about Iran-Contra scandal. The Final Report of Judge Lawrence Walsh, the Independent Counsel for Iran-Contra Matters, issued on Aug. 4, 1993, concluded, "Robert M. Gates was the Central Intelligence Agency's deputy director for intelligence (DDI) from 1982 to 1986. He was confirmed as the CIA's deputy director of central intelligence (DDCI) in April of 1986 and became acting director of central intelligence in December of that same year. Owing to his senior status in the CIA, Gates was close to many figures who played significant roles in the Iran/contra affair and was in a position to have known of their activities."

The report continued, "Gates was an early subject of Independent Counsel's investigation, but the investigation of Gates intensified in the spring of 1991 as part of a larger inquiry into the Iran/contra activities of CIA officials. This investigation received an additional impetus in May 1991, when President Bush nominated Gates to be director of central intelligence (DCI)."

Walsh re-focused on Gates after Clair E. George, the CIA's Deputy Director for Operations stonewalled the prosecutor on the role of Gates in Iran-Contra crimes. Walsh reserved the right to re-open the investigation of Gates but was stymied by the non-cooperation of George and Gates. Walsh said new information "could have warranted reopening his inquiry [of Gates], including testimony by Clair E. George, the CIA's former deputy director for operations. At the time Independent Counsel reached this decision [not to prosecute Gates], the possibility remained that George could have provided information warranting reconsideration of Gates's status in the investigation. George refused to cooperate with Independent Counsel and was indicted on September 19, 1991. George subpoenaed Gates to testify as a defense witness at George's first trial in the summer of 1992, but Gates was never called."

It is clear from the Walsh Report that Gates was an integral part of the illegal network that sold TOW anti-tank missiles to Iran in exchange for the release of U.S. hostages in Lebanon and that proceeds from the arms sales were illegally diverted to the Nicaraguan Contras. That put Gates inside a web of conspirators in the illegal arms sales and money transfers who included Oliver North, National Security Adviser John Poindexter, former National Security Adviser Robert McFarlane, intermediaries Manucher Ghorbanifar, Albert Hakim, Mohsen Kangarlu, and Maj. Gen. Richard V. Secord, Hashem Rafsanjani (the nephew of Iranian leader Ali Akbar Rafsanjani), and other senior CIA officials.

Former CIA officer Mel Goodman's charges against Gates are cited in Mark Perry's book Eclipse: The Last Days of the CIA. Goodman said that Gates and CIA director William Casey were very much involved in the Iran-Contra scandal, having "purposely manipulated the Directorate of Intelligence in order to support the opening to Iran in 1985." Goodman also charged that Gates and Casey "consistently underestimated evidence of economic problems in the Soviet empire because the data did not accord with their own beliefs; they had suppressed and derailed intelligence estimates that called into question Soviet sponsorship of international terrorism; they had dictated a study that showed Soviet complicity in the attempted assassination of Pope John Paul II when no such evidence existed." Gates' successor, Judge William Webster, according to Perry's account, opened an investigation of Casey's and Gates' attempt to politicize the CIA. The Democratic Congress should subpoena the Webster investigation in the confirmation hearings of Gates to be Defense Secretary.

In what makes the more recent lying about pre-war intelligence on Iraq seem like deja vu, Goodman said that Gates "had contempt for a process that was designed to allow independent analysis [and] the President of the United States was given falsified reports and uncoordinated analysis."

Gates obfuscation on Iran-Contra continues to this day. As President of Texas A&M University, Gates has been the host for the George H. W. Bush Presidential Library. In the bowels of the library are presidential papers that could shine a bright light on the Iran-Contra scandal. However, in November 2001, George W. Bush signed an executive order that upended the 1978 Presidential Records Act and permits the Bush Iran-Contra papers to be kept secret in perpetuity. The executive order also affects 60,000 pages of papers from the Reagan Presidential Library that include details of then-Vice President George H. W. Bush's role in Iran-Contra. Robert Gates has always been a trusted consigliore for the Bush family. At the Pentagon, he will undoubtedly use his two years to clean up for Dubya and suppress incriminating information on the Iraq debacle -- all in a continuing effort to protect the Bush family legacy. His nomination should be rejected."

I C&P'd the whole thing because there is no way to provide a click directly to the article after it has been replaced as Madsen's top story.
Original Sourece Wayne Madsen Reports