A Clandestine Trip and a Four-Decade Secret: An Untold Story Behind Jimmy Carter's Defeat
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Source: NYT
His longtime political mentor invited him on a mission to the Middle East. What Mr. Barnes said he did not realize until later was the real purpose of the mission: to sabotage the re-election campaign of the president of the United States.
It was 1980 and Jimmy Carter was in the White House, bedeviled by a hostage crisis in Iran that had paralyzed his presidency and hampered his effort to win a second term. Mr. Carters best chance for victory was to free the 52 Americans held captive before Election Day. That was something that Mr. Barnes said his mentor was determined to prevent.
His mentor was John B. Connally Jr., a titan of American politics and former Texas governor who had served three presidents and just lost his own bid for the White House. A former Democrat, Mr. Connally had sought the Republican nomination in 1980 only to be swamped by former Gov. Ronald Reagan of California. Now Mr. Connally resolved to help Mr. Reagan beat Mr. Carter and in the process, Mr. Barnes said, make his own case for becoming secretary of state or defense in a new administration.
What happened next Mr. Barnes has largely kept secret for nearly 43 years. Mr. Connally, he said, took him to one Middle Eastern capital after another that summer, meeting with a host of regional leaders to deliver a blunt message to be passed to Iran: Dont release the hostages before the election. Mr. Reagan will win and give you a better deal.
Read more: https://www.nytimes.com/2023/03/18/us/politics/jimmy-carter-october-surprise-iran-hostages.html
This has been stated and restated many times since 1980. Barnes had the sheer gall to say this about his betrayal and silence:
Mr. Barnes said he did not reveal the real story at the time to avoid blowback from his own party. I dont want to look like Benedict Arnold to the Democratic Party by participating in this, he recalled explaining to a friend. The headlines at the time, he imagined, would have been scandalous. I did not want that to be on my obituary at all.
But as the years have passed, he said, he has often thought an injustice had been done to Mr. Carter. Discussing the trip now, he indicated, was his way of making amends. I just want history to reflect that Carter got a little bit of a bad deal about the hostages, he said. He didnt have a fighting chance with those hostages still in the embassy in Iran.
liberalla
(9,860 posts)snowybirdie
(5,553 posts)has been bantered around for 40 years. Finally the NYT has gotten around to verifying it. About time!
DemocraticPatriot
(5,410 posts)of it!
Previous versions may have had the details wrong, they supposed that Casey was the person doing the dirt--
those stories never seemed to consider that lower-level people did all the talking to Iran.
In any case, now we have a confession out of their own Republican treasonous mouths...
At least this lower functionary tried to do the right thing at the last moment,
with President Carter on his deathbed.
That does not excuse what he did back then,
but it confirms the fact that this conspiracy did exist, from a Republican who participated at the time.
No longer can they call it "a conspiracy theory".
keep_left
(2,276 posts)The Nixon campaign tried to undermine the ongoing Paris peace talks. They were apparently overconfident in their ability to keep things secret, and the NSA was listening in. I've forgotten who broke the news to LBJ, but I recall it being described as "treasonous" on the part of the Nixon officials. The story was kind of an open secret for many years, and I remember it being officially confirmed on Amy Goodman's Democracy Now! show.
Miguelito Loveless
(4,626 posts)would have done the country a great service if he had blown the whistle on Nixon in 68.
bucolic_frolic
(46,412 posts)keep_left
(2,276 posts)...what the NSA had discovered. I would have to listen to that episode of Democracy Now! again, or read up on my history, but what I clearly recall is that whoever the individual was, they were very upset about the actions of the Nixon campaign, calling it "treason" in no uncertain terms. There is a recording of this meeting with LBJ in the Oval Office; it was played on the show, and it was damning.
soldierant
(7,744 posts)including the word "treasonous.
UCmeNdc
(9,649 posts)It is a history that is not well understood or reported on.
but truly, Reagan was just a pawn, like W and Trump. It was HW and his CABAL that did every thing during the Reagan "years"......
HWBush also gave the Ayatolla the promise of weapon sales to cinch the deal.........
As I recall later, Iran shot one of the missiles HW had sold them at a U.S. Navy Ship in the gulf, killing 27? sailors. I remember the Republicans having to go into overdrive for weeks to cover up the fact that it was one of our missles and everyone wondering how Iran was able to get a hold of OUR missles.......
THAT was a slam dunk for Treason, if there ever was one..............
keep_left
(2,276 posts)...that were involved in the Iran-Contra scandal. There was a really good and largely forgotten book about it, Spider's Web: The Secret History of How the White House Illegally Armed Iraq by Alan Friedman.
https://www.democracynow.org/2003/12/17/spiders_web_the_secret_history_of
https://www.amazon.com/Spiders-Web-Secret-History-Illegally/dp/0553096508
EX500rider
(11,398 posts)That was in a Iraqi fighter firing a French made Exocet missile at a US naval vessel
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/USS_Stark_incident#:~:text=The%20USS%20Stark%20incident%20occurred,attack%2C%20and%2021%20were%20injured.
Hekate
(94,107 posts)Stuff we did not know, stuff we did know, confirmation of what we intuited a long time ago.
Barnes thinks this will make amends, because Carter got a little bit of a bad deal ? Oh, I dont think this goes anywhere near making amends.
By the way, Nevilledog has the non paywall link
https://www.democraticunderground.com/100217738499
Miguelito Loveless
(4,626 posts)hamsterjill
(15,440 posts)I lived through that time frame and I cannot imagine anyone allowing those hostages to suffer one minute longer than necessary. Despicable!
DownriverDem
(6,567 posts)figured out at the time.
Pas-de-Calais
(9,979 posts)There was a book if I recall correctly
SunSeeker
(53,405 posts)PSPS
(14,085 posts)markodochartaigh
(1,877 posts)And sure he did. But I'm pretty sure that President Carter himself would say that it was really democracy in the US that took the real hit from the Republicans' self-serving and vicious coercion.
stage left
(3,009 posts)that will make you see red. "A little bit of a bad deal." It was an enormous bad deal for the hostages and for us, the American people, the beginning of our downward slide.
Rhiannon12866
(219,802 posts)It took 50 years for it to be revealed that Nixon was secretly conspiring with the Vietnamese to win in 1968 which shut down promising peace talks - and prolonged the war for seven more years resulting in thousands more war deaths on both sides. And now we learn what we always suspected, Reagan was guilty of the same foreign power collusion to defeat President Carter.
jaxexpat
(7,604 posts)And night the dusk.
dalton99a
(83,754 posts)Raven123
(5,890 posts)Think of the lives of the hostages and their families. What the he** is he thinking? His moral compass is as broken now as it was when he executed the plan
turbinetree
(25,180 posts)have you gone and spoken to Mr. Carter yet .....
Joinfortmill
(16,146 posts)Grumpy Old Guy
(3,514 posts)Too little, too late.
Blues Heron
(6,093 posts)I just want history to reflect that Carter got a little bit of a bad deal about the hostages, he said. He didnt have a fighting chance with those hostages still in the embassy in Iran.
Any message for the hostages, sicko?
Marthe48
(18,679 posts)The r line at the time was so freakin' smooth, seamless, subtle. I'll never, even fall for it again, ever.
Blues Heron
(6,093 posts)so smooth, deep, ultimately creepy in retrospect
LymphocyteLover
(6,464 posts)Blues Heron
(6,093 posts)He thinks he got away with it scot-free. Someone needs to disabuse this little punk of that notion.
AverageOldGuy
(1,925 posts)He (Barnes) was such an influential figure that he helped a young George W. Bush get into the Texas Air National Guard rather than be exposed to the draft and sent to Vietnam.
NBachers
(17,977 posts)Ollie North and the whole stinking band of republican traitors & spooks in their still-ongoing RICO Crimewave Against America:
https://democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=104x629531
Blues Heron
(6,093 posts)If he caused those people to be held even a minute longer than they would have been, he is guilty of kidnapping.
Lasher
(28,215 posts)We see this as more of a feature than breaking news. After all, this same story has been around in one form or another for years.