Final Report of The Independent Counsel for Iran/Contra Matters
Volume I: Investigations and Prosecutions
Lawrence E. Walsh; Independent Counsel
August 4, 1993; Washington, D.C.

Chapter 24: The Investigation of State Department Officials: Shultz, Hill and Platt; Part 2

Confronting Shultz, Hill and Platt With the Evidence

Questioning Shultz

In his December 16, 1986, appearance before SSCI, Shultz described his knowledge of events relating to arms shipments to Iran. Just six weeks after public exposure, this testimony was Shultz's first opportunity to testify in a closed classified setting regarding those events. Shultz testified, under oath, that his opening statement

represents an effort on my part . . . to research out what I knew about all this. . . .

I propose to proceed chronologically. My purpose here is to pass on the information in my possession. I strongly agree with the President that the sooner all available information is made available to Congress through appropriate investigating bodies and to the public, the sooner we will put all this behind us. . . .

I rely heavily in this review on documentary materials. My recollection of these events is far from perfect, especially because . . . my information and participation was sporadic and fragmentary. Nor have I consulted with any other participant in these events, so as to avoid any appearance of impropriety.

As the evidence unfolds in public, my recollection of certain events has from time to time been refreshed. This will certainly continue to happen. So I cannot claim to be presenting a totally complete and accurate recitation. On the other hand, I can and do promise as full and accurate a recitation as my present recollection permits. Moreover, by sticking to the written materials that reflect what information was available to me when the relevant events occurred, I feel reasonably confident that the facts you receive from me are accurately reported.211  

Chairman Durenberger interrupted to ask Shultz "to just share with us your habit of keeping notes and how you have refreshed your recollection on this."212   Shultz identified Hill as his notetaker and testified that "we have researched through these [notes] very painstakingly to see what we can find on this subject."213  

In 1991, the OIC determined, after reviewing a full set of Hill's notes regarding Iran that they were inconsistent with Shultz's testimony about his own lack of knowledge, that many of these notes had not been produced in response to earlier document requests, and that Platt had not produced corresponding notes of many of the same events.

Shultz voluntarily came to Washington in February 1992 for an interview with the OIC, lasting over a day and a half.214   These sessions focused on the contrast between Shultz's testimony asserting his lack of knowledge of arms shipments during the so-called "three phases" and the contemporaneous notes.215   Over the course of the interviews, Shultz's attitude evolved from combative to contrite. In the end, after confronting the evidence contained in contemporaneous notes created by his closest aides, he repeatedly admitted that significant parts of his testimony to Congress had been completely wrong. He denied that these errors had been deliberate, stating that he always had testified to the best of his recollection. He also initially denied that relevant notes were deliberately withheld from Independent Counsel or the Select Committees and he defended Hill's integrity.

At the start of the 1992 interview, before he had reviewed significant Department of State notes or been informed that many of them had not been produced to investigators in a timely fashion, Shultz vigorously defended the completeness of Hill's document production to Iran/contra investigators216   and, consequently, the accuracy of Shultz's own testimony. He said he had "very painstakingly" researched the notes and provided "the information in [his] possession" regarding "what [he] knew." Shultz stated that, although he had not participated personally in the document-review process during late 1986,217   he recalled that Hill "spent several hours on a couple of days going through" his notebooks.218   Shultz said that, "[i]n terms of time allocation, busy as we were, that was a big amount of time to allocate."219   He minimized the nature of his directive that Hill review his notebooks and extract relevant notes in preparation for the December 1986 testimony.220   Shultz also suggested at times that the responsibility to make relevant information available was that of Sofaer and the Office of the Legal Adviser, not Shultz (or, implicitly, Hill).221  

Shultz primarily blamed the investigators for not reviewing Hill's complete notebooks, which Shultz claimed were readily available to anyone who was interested.222   Yet, Hill's notebooks themselves demonstrate that Shultz always was reluctant to permit outsiders to review this comprehensive and "remorselessly precise record" of Shultz's private comments and personal reflections and communications with the President and others, including remarks regarding Vice President Bush223   and Weinberger.224  

A few examples drawn from Hill's notebooks illustrate Shultz and Hill's consistently restrictive attitude regarding dissemination of Hill's notes:

• In November 1986, it was Sofaer, acting on his own initiative, who told the Department of Justice about Hill's note establishing contemporaneous U.S. Government knowledge of the plan to ship HAWK missiles to Iran one year earlier in exchange for hostages.225   Hill was reluctant to provide a copy of that single note to the Justice Department.226  
• In early December 1986, after Meese and Sofaer had ordered the gathering of all relevant notes, Hill insisted on providing meager excerpts only to the senior FBI agent.
• On December 8, 1986, during his public testimony, Shultz informed the House Committee on Foreign Affairs that he had prepared a classified statement "based on documents that I have, cable traffic and notes that were taken at the time," and would testify about their contents in closed session.227   When counsel to President Reagan and Vice President Bush subsequently requested a copy of this classified statement, Hill said that "drag feet is the way" and told Platt to "[t]ell Sofaer to do nothing[.]"228  
• Hill also opposed a proposal by State Department lawyers that would have urged the Senate to seek Iran/contra documents directly from State, not from Department of Justice investigators:
• SSCI [Senate Select Committee on Intelligence] wants all docs [documents] A/G [Attorney General Meese] had gathered during first weekend of Iran investigation. L [Office of the Legal Adviser] proposes SSCI deal directly w [with] State. . . . This is dumb. Q [Question] is not docs, or evid [evidence], but docs gathered by A/G. [Therefore] SSCI shd [should] get copies of 1. (S) [Shultz] reply to draft NSDD [National Security Decision Directive] [and] 2. CH [Charles Hill] note of 11/18/86 McF = (S) sectelcon [secure telephone conversation] -- and ng008othing else. To deal directly w [with] SSCI wd [would] open up possibility of requests for all kinds of og008ther docs.229  
• At the end of December 1986, Platt told Hill, who noted the information with pleasure, that SSCI's initial Iran/contra report, which had been sent to the State Department for declassification, contained "no ref [reference] to notes in any way. . . ."230  

In 1987, Hill's "relevant" note excerpts were provided to the Select Committees' counsel under extraordinary restrictions. Hill's notes of a July 21, 1987, meeting of the Department of State legal team that was preparing Shultz for his testimony before the Select Committees document these restrictions and Shultz's attitude regarding Hill's notes:

0915g008 (S) [Shultz] = [meeting with] MK [Michael Kozak], LK [Libby Keefer], Abe [Sofaer]

MK -- Cmte [Committee] will have 7 books of docs [documents] for (S)

{3 vols [volumes] of CH [Charles

Hill] notes

{2 exhibit books (IR [Iran] +

Contra)

{1 classified docs books (NSPG

[National Security Planning

Group] notes)

None of which we have been given yet

Abe -- They will only refer to books a few times

(S) -- CH notes surfaced. He spent large amt [amount] of time mining them. Not public yet. Devastating if they become g722knowed known. And totally ag. [against] the agmt [agreement] by which we provided them.

* * *

Abe -- we have to keep notes out of the room or they will be tempted to make them part of the record.

(S) -- when do we get the notes back?

LK -- As soon as yr [your] test [testimony] [is] over. Belnick[231  ] will collect.

* * *

(S) -- . . . CH notes on post-revelation [period]. If published as a book, worth 5m [$5 million] at least. A fascinating tale. But terrible to have them be made public. All kinds of speculation in there.232  

When members and staff attorneys from the Select Committees interviewed Shultz at length on July 18, 1987, in preparation for his public testimony the next week, many of their questions were explicitly based on the excerpts from Hill's notebooks that had been made available to them.233   After the interview, Shultz told Sofaer and Hill that

[t]hese guys . . . have a glimpse of my life + activities as w [with] no one else they have called [to testify] -- bec. [because] of CH [Charles Hill] notes. They poring over them.234  

The next day, during a private meeting with Hill at Shultz's home, Shultz voiced additional concerns about outsiders reviewing Hill's notebooks:

(S): I've read yr [your] notes on post-revelation [period]. Astonishing story; Our behavior strong. But to have it up their on [Capitol] Hill for staff + lawyers to read -- devastating for WH [White House]. If [Hill's notes] were to be published . . . Nothing like it in history of the Republic.235  

With the cooperation of the Select Committees members and staff, almost none of Hill's notes were used as exhibits or mentioned during Shultz's public testimony before the Select Committees. When Representative Fascell referred during Shultz's testimony to a single Hill note, the occurrence was unusual enough that Hill recorded it in his notebook.236  

On August 7, 1987, after Shultz had completed his testimony and received Hill's note excerpts back from the Select Committees, he made his position abundantly clear:

CH [Charles Hill] notes. They personal. We have retrieved them from the Cmte [Committee]. Not giving them out anymore.237  

In his February 1992 interview with the OIC, Shultz indignantly denied that any information was withheld deliberately.238   He stated that he had always cooperated fully and directed his subordinates to cooperate fully with investigators.239   He said,

as far as I know, but you may have some other things, all of the fundamental and important information was placed in front of people and it turned out to be very important.240  

The OIC then confronted Shultz with handwritten notes and other documents reflecting information brought to his attention and private statements he made during the period he had labeled "phase one" of the Iran initiative (June through November 1985). He had described this in his December 1986 testimony as a period when he "learned of two proposed arms transfers, but was not informed that either was consummated."241   Shultz was combative throughout this segment of the interview and did not acknowledge that his testimony regarding "phase one" had been incorrect.

Despite the notes suggesting otherwise, Shultz adhered to his previous statements that he had not known of Israel's August and September 1985 TOW missile shipments to Iran, which produced the freedom of hostage Weir. He repeated his belief that Weir was released to deliver a message from the Hezbollah terrorists who had held him hostage in Lebanon, demanding the release of the Dawa prisoners in Kuwait.242   Shultz said he had "accept[ed] Weir's statement and the rationale that it contained at face value"243   and that, consequently, any broader deal involving an arms shipment "did not come off."244  

Shultz dismissed various handwritten notes that appeared inconsistent with his testimony. Shultz said that Hill's September 11, 1985, note anticipating hostage releases and "a bill for arms for IR [Iran] from Israel" was speculation by Hill.245   Hill's September 16 note -- "McF [McFarlane] + Ollie [North] are getting us into deal where we will have to pay off Isr [Israel], IR [Iran] + Syr [Syria] for what we wd [would] get from Syria for nothing following Atlit release" -- which Hill made after Weir had been released but while "op [operation] still going on," also was dismissed by Shultz as "Charlie's speculation. . . ."246  

Shultz was hard-pressed to explain other notes. He claimed, incredibly, that Hill's September 17, 1985, note reporting the NBC story regarding a plane flying arms from Israel to Iran, The Washington Post story regarding Weir's release and Hill's observation that reporters "[h]ave not yet put the two together" did not necessarily indicate that g008Hill, himself, had "put the two things together." -- even though Hill noted that in the margin.247   Shultz speculated that his telling answer to Whitehead's question on September 21 -- Whitehead: "Do you think they tell the President?" Shultz: "Yes, but he doesn't appreciate the problems with arms sales to Iran." -- referred not to an actual arms sale that had just occurred, but the Israeli proposal a month earlier.248   According to Shultz, Raphel's November 12, 1985, note of his meeting with Armacost, Oakley, Borg and Ross -- "Iranian/Israeli connection -- got Weir released" -- was the speculation of that senior group, not something he in 1992 agreed with in fact.249   Shultz explained that, while he could not recall in 1992 what he thought at particular points during fall 1985,250   "I testified what I thought in December [1986] when I testified before the Senate."251  

Shultz also tried to square his knowledge of Israel's shipment of HAWK missiles to Iran in late November 1985 with his testimony that he "was not informed" during the first "phase" that an arms transfer to Iran "was consummated." Although Shultz admitted that he had known of the HAWK missile shipment by December 6, 1985,252   Shultz claimed that his knowledge of a HAWK missile delivery to Iran did not mean that he knew that a delivery had been "consummated":

Q: When you said not consummated, an arms transfer in fact did take place.

A: That's right.

Q: Why the use of the term consummated since you were aware that an arms transfer had taken place in November of '85?

A: Well, it had not taken place in the sense that the arms were not accepted by Iran and they were rejected so it hadn't taken place. That's what I said.

Q: They were ultimately returned but you were aware that they went there and that it was some period of time when they were returned. Is that correct?

A: Basically that's what I testified before the Senate.253  

After learning that Hill had not produced numerous Iran/contra notes, Shultz repeatedly and emphatically declared that he and the legal adviser's office had directed Department of State personnel to produce all relevant information to investigators and denied that there had been any process of selecting which relevant notes were to be produced.254   Shultz said that, because Hill is a person of great integrity, intellect and competence,255 his failure to produce certain notes must be attributed to honest mistakes he made during the limited time he had to review his notebooks.256  

As to his statements regarding "phase two" (December 1985 through April 1986),257   Shultz initially explained that his testimony that the United States had been "unwilling" to sell arms to Iran during this period was a description, in hindsight, of his knowledge at the end of the phase.258   He said he had testified to his understanding of what actually had happened.259   Shultz attributed particular inconsistencies with contemporaneous documents to his own oversights, his failures of recollection and his aides' failures to bring specific notes to his attention before he testified in December 1986. Thus, although Hill's December 7, 1985, note indicates that Shultz was told at the White House meeting that morning that "Isr [Israel] sent 60 I-hawks," Shultz said he "must have overlooked that in some manner."260  

Shultz said his understanding that the United States was unwilling to sell arms during this period was based on two factors: First, he claimed to be unaware of a presidential Finding legally authorizing arms shipments to Iran and, because he believed that such shipments would be illegal without a Finding, the lack of a Finding meant the United States was unwilling to ship arms to Iran;261   second, Poindexter showed Shultz talking points on February 28, 1986, for a meeting that McFarlane was to have with Iranians that would result in the release of the hostages, and the talking points did not mention arms.262  

Although Hill's February 28, 1986, notes regarding this episode do not mention arms, Independent Counsel located no copy of the McFarlane "terms of reference" in NSC records that does not mention arms.

Shultz was then shown several notes -- none of which had been produced to Congress or Independent Counsel in 1986 or 1987 -- that documented his knowledge of U.S. willingness to sell arms to Iran during phase two, December 1985 through April 1986.

Shultz had no explanation to offer when he saw Weinberger's notes of the February 11, 1986, family group lunch, which contain a detailed timeline for transferring TOW missiles from the United States through Israel to Iran within the next seven days:

A: Well, I'm surprised by this because I don't recall that being set out.

Q: Can you think of any explanation why these notes would indicate such an elaborate description of the delivery of the TOWs in light of your testimony on December the 16th[, 1986]?

A: Well, the only explanation I can think of is that this represented some sort of side conversation between Weinberger and Casey as frequently happened in these meetings but I'm not remembering this.

* * *

Q: Any other remarks about that [note] before we move on?

A: No. I don't know quite what to say about it. I am surprised by it and I don't remember it.

* * *

[Shultz:] What does this ["French dropped some demand"] refer to at the top [of Weinberger's note] then?

Q: I don't mean to be flip but I wasn't at the meeting.

A: I feel as though I wasn't either.263  

Shultz saw that Hill's February 21, 1986, note of Shultz's report on that day's family group lunch included his statement that "I think we have already turned over some wpns [weapons]." He was asked what his statement had meant:

A: It must have been just a supposition, an instinct.

Q: During this period of time in your testimony you were stating that you had strong evidence of a dialogue but [we] were unwilling to sell arms and this [note] indicates that your thoughts were at the time that "we have already turned over weapons."

A: Just that I was -- it must be that having had this described, I was uneasy that that might already have happened, but I don't know any more than what this says.

Mr. Cutler: May we have a recess?

Mr. Gillen: Just one more point before we take off.

Do you feel that this note would have been helpful to investigators in '86 and '87 if it had been turned over?

A: Well, it sure would have been helpful to me in preparing my testimony.264  

After taking a break, Shultz began with a statement before questioning resumed:

I'd like to say there[,] if there were shipments and I had known about them in my mind at the time I testified, I certainly would have testified to that effect. There was no reason for me not to set out what I knew, no reason not to, so I'm puzzled by this.265  

Shultz agreed that Hill and Platt's April 3, 1986, notes -- "Money man in town w [with] $ to pay for TOWs. . . . This all has me horrified. Region [is] petrified that Iran will win + we are helping them."266   -- would have helped him prepare his testimony in December 1986 because it is "further evidence of arms being traded."267   He said, "I think if I had this note I would have not testified the same way."268  

During the examination regarding phase two, Shultz offered an explanation for his apparent failure in December 1986 to recall events that apparently had been quite striking at the times they occurred less than a year earlier:

Q: Would the impact of a man coming to the United States "in town to pay for TOW missiles," is that something that irrespective of any notes, is that something that you could have forgotten about, having that kind of knowledge in the spring of 1986 when you testified in December of '86?

A: Well, I think in December '86 in trying to construct this testimony I basically relied on the information that we got up and felt that the notes and the documents were the best evidence that I had at the time and I went ahead on that. . . . Basically I relied on the notes that we had.269  

In contrast to the examination regarding phase one, Shultz offered no opinions during the phase-two examination regarding Hill's integrity, his efforts to produce relevant notes or reasons why relevant notes may not have been produced to Independent Counsel or the Select Committees.

Shultz was then confronted with handwritten notes and other documents reflecting information brought to his attention and statements that he made during "phase three" (May 1986 until the revelations of early November 1986), which he had described in his December 1986 testimony as a period when "I received no information indicating that an arms transfer to Iran had occurred."270  

I'm just trying to . . . get a dating for the third phase; namely, when I was told that the operation was standing down. It was the period of time from then until the release of Jacobson [sic] and that I didn't have any information. That's what I testified to. That's the dating that I had in mind.272  

Shultz then acknowledged that his information that McFarlane had delivered weapons parts to Iran was not consistent with his testimony that the United States was not willing to sell arms to Iran during phase two.273   Shultz said that

[t]he only reason that I can think is that I was not aware in my mind at the time that I testified that that was so; this is, my purpose was to be as informative as I could be and I had no reason or incentive to hold anything back.274  

After an overnight recess, Shultz reflected on the previous day's session. He did not contest the accuracy of the documents he had reviewed.275   He said that the notes had surprised him because they were not consistent with, and did not refresh, his present recollection of events.276   Shultz stated that he also had not remembered these events at the time of his testimony in December 1986 and stated categorically that, if he had recalled or if he had had these notes before him at that time, his testimony would have been different:

At the time that I testified . . . I was not aware, I didn't remember and my memory hadn't been refreshed by written material, some materials that you showed to me, and I'm certain that if I had that material in front of me, my testimony would have been different and it would have reflected that.

I also recognize that there were times when apparently from the things that you showed me, which I'm not doubting, I knew about some planned events and I didn't renew my protest to the President. I don't know why that is. . . .277  

Shultz then discussed his understanding of the July 1986 release of hostage Jenco, which occurred during "phase three." Shultz initially stated that he had no present recollection regarding Jenco's release.278   After reviewing the contemporaneous documents showing that most of his senior aides (Hill, Platt, Armacost, Ross and Raphel) had been informed at the time that the release of Jenco in July 1986 was a result of a $24 million arms deal with Iran, Shultz said flatly that he was not similarly informed.279   He admitted, however, that he would not have expected Armacost, Platt and Hill to keep such information from him.280   Shultz also did not recall reading a series of talking points that Hill had prepared for him to use with President Reagan on or about November 12, 1986, which includes Hill's handwritten note, "g008July 1986: g008Jenco released, then arms shipped to Iran ($20 million U.S. $4 million Israeli)."281  

Shultz said that, although he did not recall discussing Jenco's release with Hill in July 1986 or later during the preparation of testimony,282   he did not believe that Hill would have withheld the Jenco information.283   If Shultz had recalled that information, he added, his testimony would have been different:

Q: . . . When you were preparing with Mr. Hill based upon his review of his records, did he remind you of the Jenco release as a result of the Polecat $24 million in weapons?

A: I think if I knew this to be a fact when I testified, I would have testified to it.

Q: What you did testify was that "I received no information [during phase three] indicating that an arms transfer to Iran had occurred." This [November 10, 1986, Hill] note indicates that on the summary review of Mr. Hill that "the Jenco release was Polecat, $24 millon in weapons."

A: Well, as I said, if I knew that to be a fact I wouldn't have testified the way I did.284  

Questioning Hill

Shortly after the OIC interviewed Shultz on February 12-13, 1992, it conducted a two-day interview of Hill on February 21 and February 24, 1992. The questioning focused on his handwritten notes and their nonproduction.

Prior to interviewing Hill, the OIC had already obtained some information about Hill's actions in the weeks after the November 1986 exposure of the Iran arms sales. The State Department in 1988 had produced copies of most of his notes from November and December 1986. He had been interviewed on several occasions by the FBI and the OIC.285   He had answered written questions from OIC on January 22, 1992.286  

The OIC had also obtained from the State Department in February 1992 a handwritten chronology prepared by Hill on November 8, 1986,287   which appeared to record information that Shultz had received regarding the arms sales. The chronology is incomplete in subtle but important ways. For example, a May 22, 1986, entry in the chronology discusses (1) North going to Cyprus with a non-Iranian intermediary, (2) a $10 million donation by Catholic Relief Services to poor Shia Moslems in Lebanon, and the release of all hostages within a week.288   But Hill's actual notes from May 22, 1986 -- which were not produced to the FBI or to Congress in 1986 or 1987 -- go on to quote Shultz as stating that "[t]his is to be cover story for our shipment of TOWs to Iranians."289   The omitted quote reveals Shultz's awareness of an arms-for-hostages exchange in May 1986 that is inconsistent with Shultz's disclaimers of Iran arms sales knowledge in his testimony.

Finally, the OIC knew that Hill had limited the excerpts from his notes provided to State Department lawyers and to the FBI prior to Shultz's December 16, 1986, testimony,290   to those consistent with the "three-phase" description given by Shultz in his testimony.

At the outset of his February 1992 OIC interview, Hill acknowledged that he had spoken with Shultz and his lawyers about the questions the OIC had asked Shultz just ten days earlier.291   Throughout the interview, Hill denied having intentionally withheld any notes from investigators. Hill offered a multi-layered explanation for his failure to include certain relevant notes among the excerpts he gathered in preparation for Shultz's December 1986 testimony. Hill repeatedly downplayed the significance or credibility of the information in notes he had omitted from these excerpts. Hill said that he had played only a minor role in preparing Shultz for his December 1986 testimony.292  

Hill's basic position during the interview was that he was never asked to review all of his notes for all entries relevant to the Iran arms sales, and that he never undertook a review of his notes for this purpose. In early November 1986, as the Iran arms sales were first becoming public, Shultz and Hill traveled to Vienna, Austria.293   During their travel, Shultz and Hill discussed the history of the arms sales but were unable to recall many of the details of what had occurred.294   Upon their return to the United States, Hill spent a dozen or more hours on Saturday, November 8, 1986, reviewing his notes. This review provided the basis for his November 8, 1986, chronology.295  

According to Hill, however, Shultz rejected the chronology the very next day, because it contained some information he had learned only after the public revelation of the arms sales. Shultz believed that the chronology did not accurately reflect what Shultz had known at specific points during the course of the arms sales.296   Hill told the OIC that he then became preoccupied with assisting Shultz's efforts to quash the ongoing efforts to engage Iran in arms-for-hostages transactions.297   Accordingly, he did not conduct any further review of his notebooks until late November or early December 1986, when he searched for information that would aid in the preparation of Shultz's upcoming congressional testimony.298  

As Hill explained it, even this review had only a limited purpose. Hill was not searching for all notations relevant to the Iran arms sales. Rather, he was attempting "to go and get what in [Shultz's] view were the key -- as best we could recall it then -- what were the key elements in his effort to stop [the Iran arms sales] in the past."299   In other words, Hill reviewed his notes not to refresh Shultz's memory by identifying all relevant notes, but to provide support for those events that Shultz actually remembered.300  

Even with this qualification, Hill was at a loss to explain why certain notes were not provided, Hill admitted that he should have included specific notes in his excerpts and had made a mistake by not doing so. These included:

• A November 14, 1985, note of Armacost telling Shultz that McFarlane had recently asked Weinberger how to get HAWK and Phoenix missiles to Iran -- Hill said, "This one simply escaped me."301  
• An April 3, 1986, note of a "horrified" Shultz telling Hill there is a "money man" in town to pay for TOW missiles, and that the McFarlane Tehran meeting -- during which the hostages will be released -- will be set once payment is made -- Hill said, "if I had seen this and focused on it, it would have been relevant and I would have brought it to his [Shultz's] attention in that [December 1986] period. I did not do so and I fault myself for that."302  
• An April 15, 1986, note indicating that Hill and Shultz discussed a report that North and McFarlane were going to Tehran in late April to work on "hostages for arms" -- Hill said, "I don't know why I didn't catch it. I didn't catch it."303  
• A July 16, 1986, note about Shultz and Hill discussing the possibility of using an official of another country to pursue contacts with Iran and serve as a "[w]ay out of Polecat" -- Hill said he "entirely missed it in the review," called that "a lapse on my part" and said "as part of the great blank of whiteness out there, it was just not there."304  
• A July 28, 1986, note reporting that Jenco was released as a result of Polecat -- specifically, a $24 million weapons deal between the U.S. and Iran -- Hill said this was "a major error on my part of misjudgment;" "[m]y analytical and judgmental abilities simply weren't functioning."305  

Hill claimed that in omitting the July 28, 1986, note regarding the Jenco release, he "simply missed this period in terms of significance. It was a great gap which I now see but I did not see at that time."306   But a note Hill wrote on November 10, 1986, plainly shows that Hill did not miss this note. He summarized it during his November 1986 review of his notes:

g008from CH [Charles Hill] notebooks

7/28 g008Jenco release (July) was Polecat $24 m [$24 million] in wpns [weapons.] next will be [Terry] Anderson307  

Hill also referred to the Jenco information when preparing materials for Shultz to use during a November 12, 1986, meeting with President Reagan.308   In addition to written talking points,309   Hill made several handwritten notations on a page that contained a copy of a November 12, 1986, Washington Post compilation of "Administration Statements on Iran." This page was stapled to the typed talking points when the OIC found these documents at the State Department in 1992. Hill's fifth handwritten notation on this page reads:

g008July 1986: g008Jenco released, then

arms shipped to Iran ($20

million U.S., $4 million

Israeli).310  

Hill claimed that in 1987 he turned over all of his notes from the "after the revelation" period.311   But the November 10 note, which summarized the July 28 Jenco note, was not among the package he produced in 1987. Hill produced 24 pages of notes he had taken on November 10, 1986, including the pages immediately before and immediately after the original page that referred to the July 28, 1986, Jenco note, but not that page itself.

He also reformulated his basic explanation of the limited purpose for which he reviewed his notes prior to Shultz's December 1986 testimony. He said he did not review his notes to buttress all of the points that Shultz remembered, but only to identify a narrow category of information:

I went to my notebooks and went to the time periods that we had thought in Vienna were the key periods in Shultz's reconstruction of this at which he felt that he had enough direct information and the ability to deal with the principals of this [], that is Poindexter or whomever, and to throw himself into it and to try and he thought make a fundamental shift in the way things were going.312  

Later, Hill offered another narrow formulation of the purpose of his search:

What [Shultz] wanted to do was to talk about or to convey to the Senate what on key events when he was unmistakably confronted with a situation, what action he took in general outline, again given the objective that he set for himself with regard to the December testimony.313  

Hill claimed that he was looking for only those notes that reflected times when Shultz was "unmistakably confronted" with "direct evidence" under circumstances where he could "deal with the principals" in order to cause a "fundamental shift" in U.S. policy toward Iran. With these quoted phrases, Hill exposed the selective nature of Shultz's testimony, as well as Hill's document production.

Asked about specific relevant notes that he did not include in the excerpts he provided to Sofaer's office and to the FBI. Hill observed variously, that the actual events differed from certain notes that anticipated them,314   did not directly involve Shultz,315   that Shultz and he had not really understood the information at the time they received it,316   that the information passed on to Shultz was not sufficiently reliable,317   that he (Hill) did not believe the information he recorded in his notes.318  

The events recorded in some of the withheld notes were of such significance that it is difficult to believe that Hill overlooked these notes in the production process. For example, Hill noted on September 17, 1985, separate press reports that (1) Israeli arms had been sent to Iran, and (2) Weir had been released. Hill noted that "Bud's folly is out," and Shultz's reaction: "Well, sometimes you have to try things."319  

Hill recalled "virtually running into [Shultz's] office to tell him . . . [that] we've caught the guy," that is, that McFarlane's arms-for-hostages "folly" is now exposed. Shultz was "totally surprised and in a sense disbelieving," and responded that "sometimes you've got to try things." Shultz felt "resigned" and "defeated" to learn of these arms shipments.320   Hill's explanation for not producing the notes: the events later appeared not to have happened exactly as described in the note. Nonetheless, Hill and Shultz discussed it prior to Shultz's testimony.321  

Hill also did not include in his excerpts a May 22, 1986, note describing (1) Ollie North and a non-Iranian intermediary traveling to Cyprus, (2) a $10 million Catholic Relief Services donation to poor Shia Muslims in Lebanon, and (3) the concomitant release of all hostages.322   Immediately after listing these three events, the note quotes Shultz as saying, "This is to be cover story for our shipment of TOWs to Iranians."323   Though plainly relevant to what Shultz knew about the Iran arms sales, Hill did not provide this note to investigators. He explained:

[T]his is in the category of things that do not happen, stories that prove to be false, false starts, rumors, assertions that are not borne out, claims that something is going on that seems not to be going on, and therefore it is not in the realm of something where he [Shultz] has taken action.324  

Actually, the note refers to a cover story for the expected release of hostages after McFarlane's mission to Tehran. The failure of the mission does not negate Shultz's knowledge of it.325  

Hill explained his failure to include certain notes from September 1985 by stating that the events described were not ones in which Shultz participated in a meaningful way.326   As Hill phrased it:

[T]he outcome of this September event to us . . . was that this was a zero and if there was an outcome it was that our suspicions are heightened but it was not part of what the Secretary -- it did not make the cutoff in terms of the Secretary wanting to say what his specific role was to be.

My impression before the testimony was that he wanted to confine himself to what he had actually done, taken steps to do when he was confronted with the opportunity to make an impact.327  

Hill claimed he omitted notes about McFarlane's trip to Tehran because Shultz and he did not fully understand the information. On Monday, May 19, 1986, five days before the trip, Hill asked Shultz if the Iran arms sales were discussed at a lunch with Casey, Weinberger and Poindexter. According to Hill's note, Weinberger told Shultz about an intelligence report that McFarlane "wd [would] get arms there [to Iran]" and "then they would see about hostg [hostages]." The note identifies the arms as anti-missile system parts.328  

The note plainly refers to McFarlane's mission. Yet Hill claimed that he did not include this note because he did not understand it:

Again, I don't understand this note. I didn't understand it then and because it's not in verbatim language, I can only speculate of [sic] what it might be and I hesitate to do that because I don't find enough in this, I didn't find enough in this to make anything even close to a stab in the dark about it.329  

Hill claimed that he omitted notes as not sufficiently reliable -- just "a story we hear"330   -- even when the sources were Poindexter and Weinberger. On May 22, 1986, Hill wrote: "Pdx = Wbger. [Poindexter-Weinberger]" and then "Deliveries g008are being made of our mil [military] equip [equipment] -- may see action today on release."331   Hill admitted that Shultz should be informed at the time, because "it's the principals, that is Poindexter and Weinberger, talking. . . ."332   But he omitted the note from his excerpts:

I don't think that I would have [brought this note to the attention of those who were preparing Shultz for his testimony], given what I was looking for because, again, this was -- it fits with the one we just discussed, a story we hear. It's not direct, the Secretary cannot credit it although I think that he feels that there is something going on here and he has to freeze and very shortly it doesn't happen, there is no immediate release of all the hostages.333  

Hill failed to produce some notes, even though given to Shultz before his testimony. For example, a note taken on January 14, 1986:

Arma [Armacost] g008= [meeting with] S [Shultz]. g008Hostg [Hostage] dealing still going on. Ollie [North] under pressure to produce before St [State] of Union speech. . . . (S): WH [White House] is running this. No comment334  

Hill said he omitted it because the information was just another unreliable story about North's actions. "This document to me was part of the -- I don't mean to be impertinent at all but on the laughable cavorting of North."335   Yet, he nonetheless included this document in the chronology he initially tendered to Shultz on November 8, 1986, because he "was not making judgments of significance" about the material he included in the chronology.336  

Lastly, there are instances where Hill downplayed the significance of information relayed to him by Shultz, claiming that Hill did not believe the information. After a January 7, 1986, meeting with the President, Shultz reported the following information to Hill, who recorded it in his notes:

g008Iran Polecat. g008P [President Reagan] decided go ahead. Only Cap [Weinberger] & I opposed. I won't debf [debrief] anybody about it. (TOWS for hostages)337  

Hill testified that even though Shultz had told him that President Reagan had decided to go forward on "Polecat," Hill did not believe that Reagan had decided any such thing:

I didn't read it that way. . . . The national security adviser [Poindexter] would never allow the President to make a decision at an NSC or NSPG meeting. The President would give his views . . . and then go away and make a decision at some later point. . . . I said [to Shultz], "It's awful," but I wasn't reading this as an official decision.338  

Hill also asserted that even though this note depicts Shultz's knowledge of important events relating to the Iran arms sales, this was not the precise type of information Hill was seeking during his notes review:

[I]t's because with the Secretary's view of what the important points were, they were points at which he felt that there would be clear knowledge that an operation was taking place and that he could do something about it. That would be his recounting of what were his actions, not his recounting of what were other people's actions.339  

The note reflects a meeting with the President at which Shultz argued against the Iran initiative and lost. Hill said it did not reflect Shultz's actions, but "other people's actions."

Hill struggled to explain why he included this information in the chronology he prepared for Shultz on November 8, 1986, but excluded the information from the excerpts he later turned over to Sofaer's office and to outside investigators.

Clearly it is a matter of some significance. I feel that what we were -- when the testimony was going forward, what he [Shultz] was looking for was something that he felt he knew in terms of an operation as in the case of McFarlane's call to him [in] Geneva that he could actually take action upon.

I am now saying my own interpretation of this note at the time and it was something where he wasn't going to talk about it, therefore we did not discuss it, which was that the President at this time -- and this is my own recollection of my own thoughts -- had given an indication at this meeting that he was willing to consider anything to get the hostages out and that we could expect people to be running around, probably Ollie North and McFarlane, trying to cook up some kind of an operation, some kind of an arrangement -- again I'm speaking for myself -- that would come back, that they would take back to the President to say okay or not.

That's the kind of event that the Secretary felt -- when those events came forward, that's when he could do something himself where he was involved and not simply a listener and not simply letting someone else do something.340  

Hill also claimed that the "TOWS for hostages" language was not a note of what Shultz said, but rather was Hill's guess as to what was going to happen.341   But Hill could not explain where he learned what type of weapons were involved, if not from Shultz.342  

Whatever the credibility of Hill's various explanations, the excuses all share a fundamental problem: Hill received a memorandum from Sofaer and Bouchard on November 29, 1986, calling for the production of all documents -- including personal notes -- relevant to the Iran arms sales.

The plain terms of this memorandum from the chief legal and administrative officials at State required Hill to produce all of his notes that contain information relevant to the Iran arms sales. Hill had a simple explanation why he did not turn over all relevant notes. According to Hill, Sofaer orally told him that he did not have to comply with the terms of the November 29, 1986, memorandum. As Hill explained it, he had a conversation with Sofaer before the memorandum came out:

[Sofaer] had told me that I would have to obtain the [notes], have them in a secure place, have them close at hand, be ready to produce them as requested, and that because it already had been gathered together, they should be retained right where they were which was a few yards from his office and I should just hold myself ready which is the situation that I agreed to.343  

Because of this understanding, Hill asserted in 1992 that "[n]o one ever asked me to produce any note," the November 29, 1986, memorandum notwithstanding.344   Phrasing things slightly differently, Hill elsewhere stated that by following Sofaer's instructions about keeping his notes ready and available, "constructively [his notes] were turned over to the legal adviser's office although they remained in the safe where they were held."345   Hill claimed he assumed that Sofaer and others in the legal adviser's office informed investigators that Hill's excerpts did not contain all relevant passages from his notes.346  

Hill went so far as to assert that holding on to his notes, instead of turning them over to Department of State legal counsel and to the FBI, affirmatively helped the investigation into the Iran arms sales:

Q: Mr. Hill, how many documents do you think law enforcement officials would have received if everyone constructively produced [their] notes such as you did?

A: Well, everyone shouldn't do that. That would be a terrible mistake. They should produce their documents. I fully agree with that.

I felt that what was being done here would be more effective and a superior way to serve the investigation, which I certainly wanted to serve. . . .347  

Sofaer directly and sharply contradicted Hill's explanation. Sofaer acknowledged that Hill was supposed to retain his original notebooks, but that is where Hill and Sofaer's recollections diverged. According to Sofaer:

It was also true that [Hill] was required by [the November 29, 1986] memorandum, and I never excused this in any way, shape, or form, to review those notes and to provide me, among others, with information in those notes that was responsive to these demands.

You know, there are things you might forget after all the years, but that is not one of them.348  

During this same interview, Sofaer restated the point even more forcefully:

Every single person had a total duty, an absolute duty, to supply everything called for by [the November 29, 1986] memo and thereafter to supply everything relevant to Shultz's testimony so the Secretary wouldn't make a mistake in his testimony.349  

Sofaer explained that the reason he allowed Hill to retain possession of his notes "was because he [Hill] would be trusted to give us all the relevant information."350   Sofaer "fully assumed that a thorough review had been made."351   Hill never informed Sofaer that he was forwarding only those notes that matched Shultz's recollection.352   In fact, Sofaer stated that

the thing that enabled me to authorize Shultz to testify [only] to what he knew was that everything he didn't know that we had within our power and control we were going to give to the FBI, to the Tower Board, whatever we had then, to the Iran-contra committee on the Hill, to the Independent Counsel.353  

Thus, Hill's claim that he and the legal adviser had an understanding about the limited scope of Hill's notebook review354   was flatly contradicted by Sofaer.

One point of conflict between Hill and Sofaer -- Hill's participation in the preparation of Shultz's testimony -- was resolved. Hill at first claimed he never compared his notes with Shultz's testimony, did not review Shultz's testimony before Shultz delivered it, never read Shultz's testimony, and did not know what that testimony was.355   Sofaer had a different recollection of the preparation of Shultz's summer 1987 testimony:

[Hill] would sit in on the meetings and watch things, read the drafts, comment on them. He played a substantial role. . . . He would comment on what the evidence showed about what the Secretary knew, how we ought to express it, how he understood it as a result. He was a full participant in preparing the Secretary for his testimony on each occasion that the Secretary testified.356  

When confronted with his December 7, 1986, note on Shultz's December 8, 1986, testimony, stating "ok, I /s/ [sign] off" on Shultz's December 8, 1986 testimony,357   Hill acknowledged that his earlier recollection was incorrect.358  

Testimony from two State Department lawyers involved in the Department's response to congressional and criminal investigators corroborates Sofaer's recollection. Neither Elizabeth Keefer nor Michael Kozak, who were on the staff of the legal adviser's office, understood that Hill reviewed his notes for the limited purpose of supporting Shultz's memory of events. Both believed that Hill conducted a complete review of all of his notes in advance of Shultz's December 1986 testimony for the purpose of identifying all information relevant to the Iran arms sales.359   Both understood that Hill was fully obligated to comply with the terms of Sofaer's November 29, 1986, memorandum calling for the production of all relevant documents. Neither Keefer nor Kozak had excused Hill from complying with its production instructions; and, so far as they knew, neither had anyone.360   Each was under the impression that Hill had fully complied.361  

Keefer described Hill's role in preparing Shultz for his congressional testimony as substantive.362   Kozak recalled that State Department legal counsel relied on Hill for the substance of the testimony.363  

In the meetings where Shultz's testimony was being prepared, Hill's notes were considered Shultz's recollection -- even though Shultz took part in the meetings.364   Kozak recalled that the binder of notes that Hill had identified as relevant to Iran/contra was referred to as "the Bible."365   Everyone viewed this binder of notes as the primary source of information concerning Shultz's knowledge of the Iran/contra matter, and used it to cross-check the factual accuracy of the testimony. Even Hill referred to this binder of notes as "the Bible."366  

Overall, Hill's explanations as to why specific relevant notes were not turned over either to Sofaer's office or to the FBI were a combination of admitted errors and strained, inconsistent rationalizations. None of his stated excuses can be squared with Sofaer, Keefer and Kozak's clear memories that Hill, like everyone else, was required by Sofaer's November 29, 1986, memorandum to produce all notes in his possession that were relevant to the Iran arms sales. Hill alone asserted that he was called upon to identify only those notes that supported selected events recalled by Shultz, and that he was exempted from the production requirements of Sofaer's memorandum.

For the most part, Hill's state of mind and intentions in November and December of 1986 must be inferred from the notes that he did not produce and his various excuses for not producing them. But a more telling source exists in Hill's own notes. On November 21, 1986, Hill and Platt had a secure conversation in which Platt told Hill about a conversation Sofaer had with McFarlane:

MO [McFarlane] called Abe [Sofaer] + sd [said] he understood there are records in Dept [the Department of State] that cover the period & that they had been sent to Justice. Abe sd no records sent to DOJ [Justice], but he had been told some "alleged facts" from records & he had told DOJ in order to protect P [President Reagan]. Abe sd MO [McFarlane] shd [should] keep all g008his records. Abe sd DOJ has asked for all records -- specifically the Nov [November] 18, 1985 conversation. g008P auth [authorized] the investigation and they want our records.

CH [Charles Hill] raises hell.

Stop Abe for shit's sake! 367  

Hill claimed that his "intemperate outburst" meant only that "[i]t sounded like Sofaer was doing the wrong thing and so I was saying slow Sofaer down." 368 Hill denied being concerned about turning over all of his records, claiming instead that "I was concerned about things being said that were not well documented and . . . that Sofaer might conceivably be going off and giving `alleged facts.' " 369

Questioning Platt

Nicholas Platt appeared before the Grand Jury on March 27, 1992.370 He had first been interviewed by Shultz's lawyers. The OIC asked Platt general questions about his actions in 1985 and 1986, and then reviewed specific notes he took during that period. Unlike Hill but like Shultz, Platt claimed that he had virtually no independent memory of the events of 1985 and 1986. Platt stated that his notes were his memory.371

Despite this disclaimer, Platt did recall a few relevant points. First, Platt said he passed on "virtually everything" he heard about the Iran arms sales to Shultz.372 This did not always mean speaking with Shultz directly. Platt would most often communicate the information to Hill.373 Platt believed that "passing information to Charles Hill was the equivalent of passing it to the Secretary." 374

Platt had limited involvement in the preparation of Shultz's December 1986 congressional testimony. He "did sit in on meetings that [Shultz] had about his testimony with other advisors who were charged with preparing it." 375 According to Platt, Hill was one of those charged with preparing Shultz's testimony, working in conjunction with Sofaer and others.376

Platt recalled receiving Sofaer's November 29, 1986, memorandum directing him and others to turn over all relevant documents, including notes.377   Beyond this basic recollection, Platt's memory of the document-production process was, by his own admission, "flawed."378   He did not remember what guidance he received on how to handle his personal notes.379   He recalled reviewing his notes and marking relevant passages with paper clips.380   But Platt could not remember when he provided copies of these relevant notes to Sofaer's office.381   Platt made no claim that Sofaer or anyone else had exempted him from the production required by the November 29, 1986, memorandum.

Platt claimed to recall that he produced a limited number of notes on a specific subject on December 3 or 4, 1986,382   but he acknowledged that a recent telephone conversation with Hill had "refreshed" Platt's memory of this production.383   Platt could not recall the purpose of this limited production or the subject matter.384   Independent of Hill's reminder, Platt could not recall producing any notes.385  

Platt acknowledged that he and Hill had discussed the areas of concern that had arisen in Hill's February 1992 OIC interview.386   Hill also reminded Platt of the various "phases" of the State Department's awareness of the Iran arms sales.387   Hill told Platt that, as a result of Hill's interview with the OIC, Hill felt that Shultz's testimony "in one place . . . [s]hould have been worded differently."388  

Platt was questioned about several specific notes of his that were not produced to any investigators prior to the spring of 1991. Platt admitted in almost every instance that (1) the note appeared to be relevant, (2) he did not know why it was not produced, and (3) he may have overlooked the information under the pressure of the burgeoning crisis that ensued after the arms sales were publicly disclosed.

For example, Platt was asked about a note he took on September 16, 1985, regarding the Weir release.389   The note discusses conversations among Oakley, McFarlane and North regarding the mechanics of the hostage release and potential problems. Platt did not deny the relevance of the note, and could not explain why it was not produced:

Q: Why did you not produce this note, pursuant to the November the 29th, '86 memorandum?

A: I can't -- I cannot explain, other than to say that it related to -- this is a note that relates to the fact of Weir's having been released. It doesn't refer to arms for hostages, although it does mention Bud and Ollie. Anyway, I made it available later [in 1991]. I don't know why it wasn't released then. It was overlooked.

* * *

Q: You believe now it should have been produced?

A: Yes, I would think so.390  

Platt did not defend the omission of an October 4, 1985 note, which quotes Shultz as saying that he intends to speak with McFarlane about intelligence that points "toward 100 mil. [$100 million] deal for spare parts for Iran to be delivered in Spain."391   Platt acknowledged that this was a significant note relating to the Iran arms sales:

I can only conjecture or speculate that it was -- that I overlooked it. I have no recollection of having decided not to send it. All I can say is that I was motivated by a desire to comply with the desires of the law enforcement agencies and did the best that I could at the time.392  

Likewise, Platt could not explain the non-production of a June 1, 1985, note that discusses NSC consultant Michael Ledeen's presence in Israel seeking "Israeli cooperation on Iran intelligence":393  

I can't recall why it wasn't produced. I can only speculate from the context and the appearance that the reference was hidden and there isn't a specific link between Iran and arms. There's no mention of arms here.

But I can't recall why it's not there. It may just have been overlooked.394  

As to some specific notes, including the two just discussed, Platt suggested that the information was hidden or obscure.395   As to others, Platt asserted that the hectic circumstances of November and December 1986 made it impossible for him to do the kind of careful review done by the OIC after it acquired a complete set of Platt's notes in 1991:

The milieu we were living in was one of very high pressure, a lot of events, a lot of activity, and review of notes -- it was very difficult for any of us to get the time off to do the kind of careful review of notes that this investigation suggests that we should have been able to do.396  

Elsewhere, Platt stated:

Well, I can only say that there were a lot of things going on. There was a huge amount of material to screen. . . . All I'm saying is, when I was going through the review process, I was preoccupied with a lot of other things.397  

But Platt acknowledged that some notes he omitted were obviously significant and should not have been overlooked.

Platt, no less than Hill, had his greatest difficulty explaining the omission of passages of notes containing critical information about the release of Jenco in July of 1986. The Department of State in 1987 produced a Platt note segment from July 26, 1986, that discussed some basic aspects of the Jenco release:

g008July 26, 1986Informal working group set up

-- Jencko out. Now with Amb / 10:50 plane arrives in Syria will 1330 Frankfurt leave via US Aircraft for Wiesbaden tomorrow 27th 9:00 AM.

ALDAC [All Diplomatic and Consular Posts] Sec [Shultz] approved Press Statement release this AM. Condolence message. --

ALDAC398  

The photocopy that the Department produced was cropped to remove the remainder of this page of Platt's notes, obliterating the following additional information:

• Release of Hostage Jenco -- result of Polecat negotiations.
• Presidential statement thanking Syrians arranged.
• next one will be Anderson.
• Dick [Murphy] calling Don Gregg. VP [Bush] may delay departure399  

The note continues on the top of the following page which was not produced at all:

from Frankfurt so he can.

Price. ITOW, side winders, 155 mm ammo. [ammunition] via the Israelis.

Weir was earnest money.

Charley Allen & Dewey Clarridge at the mtg

-- Armacost calls [Head of Defense Department component] -- real negotiation had been whether it was 1 or 2. 24 million -- 4 mil laundered thru Israel -- rest in equipment, for which, he implied, they are paying.

Ollie flying out tonight400  

When shown the information that had been cut off from the first page of his July 26, 1986, notes, Platt was nonplussed:

Q: Can you please tell us, Ambassador, why you chose to make a determination that that should be redacted?

A: I have no recollection of why it was redacted. I can only speculate that when the page -- I mean, the subject changed, and I didn't carefully read on to the rest of the page. There is absolutely no reason, I don't think, why -- I mean, on the face of it, one would -- would want to cut this out.

Q: "Result of Polecat negotiations." It shows us that Jenco was released because of Oliver North, does it not, Ambassador?

A: I have no idea why I would want to hide that. Why would I want to hide that?401  

Platt later acknowledged: "It came to me as a surprise that it was cut off where it was -- looked to me as if it looked like I had something to hide."402  

He was confronted with the note taken on December 15, 1986, the day before Shultz's testimony before the SSCI, discussing "Jenco" as an area of "greatest vulnerability," apparently for Shultz, which then asks, "Why did you avert your gaze."403  

Asked to explain, he testified:

Q: To whom are these questions [in the note] directed?

A: I don't know. I can't remember. I can't tell from the context of the note. It's obviously something that was discussed, and I don't know who was saying what to who here. I'm hearing it.

Q: Well, let us look at it from another angle. You were not going to testify the next day, were you?

A: No.

Q: Charlie Hill was not going to testify the next day, was he?

A: No.

Q: Secretary Shultz was going to testify the next day. Right?

A: Yes.

Q: So, when questions concerning, "What did you think? Why did you avert your gaze?" -- are you referring to anyone other than Secretary Shultz?

A: It's a question that's asked by somebody in the meeting, but I don't know who.

Q: I see. And so, why are people concerned on the eve of Secretary Shultz's testimony that Jenco is one of the areas of greatest vulnerability?

A: I can't tell. I don't recall.404  

An obvious interpretation of the December 15, 1986, note is that Shultz was indeed told in July 1986 about the arms-for-hostages basis for Jenco's release. His advisers, in a meeting on the eve of Shultz's December 16, 1986, SSCI testimony, threw out hypothetical questions that Shultz might be asked about his reaction to Jenco's release: How did you think the Jenco release occurred? Why did you avert your gaze? Production of the note to investigators would invite additional questions.

Platt did not subscribe to this interpretation. He testified that (1) he had no idea why he would want to hide the Jenco information in the July 26th note, (2) he did not know why this information was redacted or omitted, and (3) he did not recall the meaning of the December 15th note.405  

Platt acknowledged that he had recently discussed the Jenco issue with Hill.406   Hill told him that he had found the July 1986 information about Jenco "hard to believe" at the time he heard it.407   Hill told him that he had overlooked his note on the real reasons behind the Jenco release.408  

When asked whether he had recently discussed the Jenco matter with anyone other than Hill, Platt invoked the attorney/client privilege.409   Asserting a joint defense with Shultz, Platt asserted this privilege with respect to conversations with persons other than his own attorney, including Shultz's counsel.410  

Independent Counsel decided that contesting Platt's assertion of a joint privilege was not an efficient use of limited resources. Platt's testimony showed signs of rehearsal.411   Even a successful attack upon the claim of privilege was unlikely to produce new information.

Conclusion

Shultz's Testimony Was Incorrect, But It Could Not Be Proven That It Was Willfully False

Independent Counsel's investigation established that central and important aspects of Shultz's testimony to congressional committees in late 1986 and 1987 regarding his knowledge of arms shipments to Iran were incorrect.

Shultz's carefully prepared testimony stated that he received no information regarding arms transfers to Iran during 1985 and 1986. It conveyed the impression that, because of his steadfast opposition to proposals to transfer arms to Iran, National Security Advisers McFarlane and Poindexter and the NSC staff had successfully concealed information from Shultz and the Department of State regarding actual arms transfers to Iran.

The contemporaneous handwritten notes of Hill and Platt demonstrate the inaccuracy of Shultz's assertions and the popular impression regarding his knowledge. Shultz was aware of Israel's TOW and HAWK missile transfers to Iran during 1985. He was aware of direct arms transfers from the United States to Iran during 1986. The notes also demonstrate that, to the extent Shultz did not have complete information regarding the arms transfers, his situation was caused as much by his desire not to know more as it was by efforts at the NSC staff to conceal information from him.412  

In his 1992 interviews with the OIC, Shultz did not contest the accuracy of these notes and ultimately acknowledged that his testimony had been incorrect.

Notwithstanding the gravity of Shultz's errors while testifying before Congress in 1986 and 1987, Independent Counsel declined to prosecute because the evidence did not establish beyond a reasonable doubt that his testimony was willfully false. Contemporaneous notes exposed the inaccuracy of Shultz's assertions. However difficult it may be to believe that Shultz could forget events that troubled him so deeply, it was significant that none of the contemporaneous notes created in November and December 1986 suggest that Shultz in fact remembered more or different information than that to which he testified.

Hill Deliberately Withheld Key Notes and Prepared Inaccurate Testimony Regarding Shultz's Knowledge of Arms Transfers to Iran

Although Hill claimed a variety of explanations for his failure to produce relevant notes to Iran/contra investigators, the evidence indicates that Hill withheld these notes deliberately, in conjunction with his preparation of testimony portraying Shultz as uninformed of arms shipments to Iran and victimized by the NSC staff.

Hill withheld his notes deliberately. He was clearly instructed in 1986 to locate and produce relevant entries in his notebooks, and he was not exempted from this obligation by the legal adviser.

The direct correlation between notes not produced by Hill and Shultz's disclaimers of knowledge in official testimony also is too powerful to be an accident. Although Hill claimed that Shultz had directed him to locate only those notes that corroborated Shultz's recollections, the record suggests otherwise. Shultz instructed Hill, as he instructed all Department of State employees, to locate and produce all relevant information to investigators. Sofaer, Kozak and Keefer each corroborated Shultz's recollection on this point.

Hill's notes are also too legible, and his relevant notes too easy to locate, to support his explanation for their non-production. Shultz voiced the best criticism of Hill's failure to produce obviously relevant notes:

Well, I think I'd have to put it into the context but when you have the word Polecat underlined, I should think that's the kind of thing that would attract your attention.413  

Although the evidence demonstrated beyond a reasonable doubt that Hill withheld relevant notes and helped prepare inaccurate testimony, Independent Counsel concluded it would not be appropriate to prosecute Hill, a subordinate to Shultz who had delivered that testimony and who was not the subject of a prosecution himself. Additionally, Hill's assertion that he was given an oral waiver from full document production by Sofaer could raise an issue of fact regarding events several years old that might create a reasonable doubt in the minds of jurors. Finally, the passage of time itself weighed against the prosecution of Hill, who promised little in the way of further investigative developments beyond what was contained in his extensive notes.

The Evidence That Platt Deliberately Withheld Relevant Notes Is Inconclusive

Independent Counsel's investigation in 1991 and 1992 also determined that Platt failed to produce a significant quantity of relevant handwritten notes to Iran/contra investigators. Platt's omissions are not as blatant as Hill's. His notes are more fragmentary and more difficult to review. Platt did review his notes repeatedly and made supplemental production to the legal adviser's office throughout the first few months of 1987.414   Most importantly, in the spring of 1987, Platt left his position as executive secretary and was preparing to become United States ambassador to the Philippines. He was not involved in the continuing process of preparing Shultz's testimony and so, unlike Hill, he was not as aware of the degree to which the notes that had been produced in December 1986 became "the Bible" that defined Shultz's, and the entire Department of State's, information and knowledge regarding arms transfers to Iran.

Still, the non-production of Platt's highly relevant notes is troubling. In 1987, the Department produced an innocuous Platt note reflecting Jenco's release. The redacted portion, not discovered by investigators until 1991, reveals information linking Jenco's release to the NSC Iran initiative, weapons and ammunition. Platt had no explanation for this redaction. Whether it was done by Platt or someone else in the State Department document-production process is unsettled.

Finally, there is the question whether Platt and Hill colluded to withhold corresponding portions of their notes. Coincidence is unlikely. Platt's notes were produced to the FBI in December 1986 through Hill. Given Hill's more central role in the preparation of Shultz's testimony, even at that early date, it is possible that Platt's proposed note production in December 1986 was reviewed by Hill. Given the passage of time, the absence of direct evidence of collusion, and Platt's minimal role in the preparation of Shultz's testimony, it was determined not to seek criminal charges against him.