Iran-Contra arms deal revealed: Reagan secretly sold weapons to Iran, diverted profits to Nicaraguan rebels

The Reagan administration acknowledges on November 25, 1986, that it secretly sold arms to Iran — then under a congressional arms embargo — and diverted the profits to fund Contra rebels in Nicaragua in violation of the Boland Amendment. National Security Advisor John Poindexter resigns and NSC staffer Oliver North is fired. The scheme involved selling TOW anti-tank missiles and HAWK anti-aircraft missiles through Israeli intermediaries, generating roughly $48 million in profits. The executive branch can route arms to foreign actors entirely outside the AECA's congressional notification framework by using third-party intermediaries — a structural loophole that persists decades later.