What is the "secret" of Col. North's success?

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6 SOCIALIST ACTION AUGUST 1987 How is it possible for Lieut. Col. Oliver North to come away from his five days of testifying before the congressional committee investigating the Iran/contra scandal with such a shining image when most Americans are sharply opposed to the policy he defended?

Why are the most overtly reactionary political forces triumphantly gratified by this page of the congressional investigation of Contragate?

Even President Reagan momentarily felt constrained to indicate a positive response to North's testimony. But why are the decisive editorial writers and other capitalist spokespersons straining to probe deeper, reaching closer to Reagan for a scapegoat?

The "secret" of Lieut. Col. North's success, of course, is no secret. He had been portrayed as a "loose cannon," a lowranking officer making high-level policy.

This articulate officer caught his interrogators off balance by admitting virtually every charge made by them that he couldn't evade and insisting that he acted under orders from those higher up in the Reagan administration.

The lieutenant colonel selected to be the fall-guy proved refreshingly believable, confirming a widely held belief that Reagan and those directly under him knew everything from the beginning.

But North's political defense of the contra-aid program was his real ace in the hole. Rather than deny the lying and profiteering carried out by him and his cohorts, he glibly justified it all politically.

Turns tables around

North was repeatedly able to turn every question concerning illegal activities around into an indictment of congressional hypocrisy. He hammered away on this political justification without a single serious political challenge from the congressional committees or their attorneys.

He had Congress—which had voted for arms-for-contras before and after the Boland amendment ban—against the wall. Indeed, even during the "ban," Congress had authorized $30 million in "non-lethal" aid to the murderous contra terrorists.

Congress throughout this entire period-to this day—operated on the basis of North's strategic rationale-that the contras are "freedom fighters" in the front ranks of the global struggle "for democracy against communist tyranny.

The legislators found it extremely difficult to refute North's political justification without also indicting themselves for recruiting, fielding, feeding, arming, and providing logistical support for the contras. This hated counterrevolutionary force is headed by the National Guard officer caste of former dictator and hangman-in-chief of Nicaragua, Anastasio Somoza.

The only half-hearted note struck during North's interrogation that pointed in the right direction was by Representative Ed Jenkins of Georgia, who noted that of all the "unnamed" states that contributed to the lieutenant colonel's contra-aid fund, only oneperhaps-could be considered democratic.

The states, referred to mostly by numbers, include Saudi Arabia, Taiwan, and South Korea-none of which can even remotely qualify as supporters of democracy.

Jenkins was apparently stung by North's repeated insinuation that the heads of these states were more sensitive to the "threat to democracy" in Nicaragua than was Congress. But neither Jenkins nor the congressional committees, along with their high-powered lawyers, followed up on this significant contradiction to the Reagan administration's political rationale.

In search of a scapegoat This also answers the second question posed at the beginning of this article.

Certainly, the "obedient" lieutenant colonel's testimony creates problems for those under whose command he served; a "more senior" scapegoat will need to be found.

North said that CIA Director William Casey told him that he "wasn't senior enough" to take the rap. It appears at this point that Rear Admiral John Poindexter, former national security adviser and the lieutenant colonel's boss, has been elected to take the heat...along with the late CIA Director Casey.

North's line of defense—putting the finger on his bosses-against threatened criminal charges is also intended to mobilize mass conservative support behind U.S. imperialist aims in Central America. This would help Reagan.

But according to a New York Times/CBS News poll taken when North first testified, Reagan was no hero to three out of four Americans. About the same proportion believed Reagan was lying about not knowing of the diversion of Iran funds to the contras. These polls hadn't changed significantly by the fourth day of North's testimony.

Nevertheless, North's insinuations and outright assertions that the war in Vietnam was won in the battlefield but lost in the political arena serves to justify the contra aid effort.

North's central theme was that the National Security Council "filled the gap" by providing military aid to the contras during the period of the congressional ban. Otherwise, he repeatedly lectured the Congress, the "freedom fighters" would have been crushed by "Soviet surrogates."

But while North's testimony has not made any significant impact on the overwhelming-majority opposed to the contras, it will function for some time to come as a banner for the most unrestrained rightist currents. The theme, "the politicians lost the war, not the generals," has been used effectively by fascist and other right-wing demagogues more than once before.

The ruling class and Contragate The more perceptive representatives of U.S. capitalism know full well that the big majority of the American people find the portrayal of Somoza's heirs as "freedom fighters" to be incredible.

Many are appalled by the congressional committee's incapacity to answer North's crude rationalizations. Many see the lieutenant colonel's "eloquence" to be the product of a Congress made mute by its own support of the contras.

While the American ruling class has shown no hesitations when it comes to supporting despotic regimes like those of Batista in Cuba, Somoza in Nicaragua, Marcos in the Philippines, or the Shah in Iran, these high-placed critics of Reagan's policies don't want a premature "rogue government" in this country.

Despotic rule may be indispensable for the defense of capitalism under the conditions then prevailing in those benighted lands, but in the United States today it would cause more problems than it solves.

Military-minded people, like most of those running the contra-aid operation, tend toward impatience with even the present capitalist form of democracy. They can't easily comprehend why their political representatives in Congress vacillate in their support of the contras. But the ruling class has good reason to vacillate:

• The contras have shown little capability to be more than a hated band of terrorists, uniting the people behind the Sandinista government.

• The rulers fear that the logic of continued support to the contras leads inexorably to direct commitment of American troops. They know that this means millions protesting in the streets even before maimed and dead American boys are shipped home.

• They know, too, that the U.S. economy is already under severe strain. Take-backs have ignited simmering resentment in the working class. The costs of a military adventure in Central America would lead to further reductions in living standards that would contribute to the explosive power of a mass antiwar Much as these politicians may prefer the road of military intervention in Central America and elsewhere, this massive opposition is a factor they must take into account.

Holding back the rush The most authoritative representatives of capitalism in Congress and in the corporate board rooms and editorial offices believe it would be a serious error to jump over the present forms of capitalist democracy.

They are intent on stopping the rush by the Reagan administration toward a crisisregime that would be free of control by the capitalist class as a whole.

Capitalist democracy is the most flexible and reliable form of capitalist rule. It is also the cheapest. Political dictatorship is in order for the capitalist class only when it can no longer rule with the consent of the ruled.

A premature short-circuiting of capitalist democracy would be counterproductive under present conditions of relative stability. It would serve to strip working people of the illusion that they decide much more than which bunch of capitalist scoundrels control the government. It would bring us closer to the time when workers realize they must take control of society into their own hands.

Meanwhile, the real decision-makers have clearly decided to rein in Reagan's crew. But that doesn't mean the contras will be cut off as well. The Reagan administration is hoping that North's testimony will help in securing additional contra aid next fall.

Opponents of U.S. intervention Central America must remain on guard.

The antiwar movement The Nicaraguan Revolution The fight against racism A woman's right to choose An end to apartheid The fight for socialist democ racy in Eastern Europe The need for a labor party A socialist America ... you belong in Socialist Action Contact the Socialist Action branch nearest you. See branch list page 14.

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...Col. North's -Col. North political defense of the contra-aid program was his real ace in the hole."

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