The news has been focused on retired Lt. Gen. Mike Flynn resigning from his position as President Donald Trump’s National Security Advisor as a result of allegations that he discussed easing sanctions with a Russian diplomat before he was sworn into his position. Naturally, NBC News has ridiculously described what’s going on with Flynn as “arguably the biggest scandal involving a foreign government since Iran-Contra.”
Here are the seven worst foreign-involvement scandals in American history, and neither Iran-Contra nor Flynn reached the list.
1. Benghazi. There is no foreign policy scandal worse than the Obama administration’s fecklessness in allowing four Americans to die in a series of terror attacks at the American consulate in Benghazi, Libya. To make matters worse, the administration attempted to cover it up by lying that the attack was sparked by an anti-Muslim video that nobody had seen when it actually was launched by an al-Qaeda-affiliated terror organization. There is also speculation that the reason for the United States having people at the consulate was so they could arm the Syrian rebels–which included al-Qaeda and ISIS–fighting against Syrian dictator Bashar al-Assad.
2. The Obama administration’s ransom deal with Iran. They funneled $1.7 billion to Iran in 13 incremental payments for four Americans imprisoned by the terror regime. The Obama administration left Congress completely in the dark about the details of the transaction; one of the payments involved a plane carrying foreign currency to Iran to bypass sanctions. Not only was the scandal a gross breach of separation of powers by using money not appropriated by Congress, it also put a bounty on the heads of Americans worldwide for a regime that has a history of taking Americans hostage.
3. Obama’s national security advisor, Ben Rhodes, admitted that he lied about the Iran deal to ensure its passage. David Reaboi explained in The Federalist that Rhodes gloated about spreading a false narrative about Iran and the nuclear deal through the administration’s sycophants in the media, smugly stating that the reporters they fed information to “literally know nothing.” Thus, Rhodes was able to create “an echo chamber” about Barack Obama as the protagonist in a tale where big, bad Iran took a more moderate turn with the election of Hassan Rouhani as president and Obama was able to hammer out a deal to stymie Iran’s nuclear program. Of course, such a narrative is nothing but a fable, especially since Iran has repeatedly violated the parameters of the deal and the Obama administration kept granting the terror regime exemptions so they could declare victory. If Iran does in fact develop nuclear weapons, Rhodes will be one of the people chiefly responsible for it.
4. Chinagate. Chinagate is one of the more forgotten scandals from the Clinton administration, and it happens to be the most serious in terms of the country’s national security. It was reported that the Chinese government, through various figures, donated money to the Democratic National Committee and President Bill Clinton’s 1996 campaign. Journalist Richard Poe explained some of the details: (h/t: Discover The Networks) (emphasis bolded)
“In his book The China Threat, Washington Times correspondent Bill Gertz describes how the system worked. Defense contractors eager to sell technology to China poured millions of dollars into Clinton’s campaign. In return, Clinton called off the dogs. Janet Reno and other counterintelligence officials stood down while Lockheed Martin, Hughes Electronics, Loral Space & Communications and other U.S. companies helped China modernize its nuclear strike force.
“‘We like your president. We want to see him reelected,’ former Chinese intelligence chief General Ji Shengde told Chinagate bagman Johnny Chung.
“Indeed, Chinese intelligence organized a massive covert operation aimed at tilting the 1996 election Clinton’s way.
“Clinton’s top campaign contributors for 1992 were Chinese agents; his top donors in 1996 were U.S. defense contractors selling missile technology to China.
“Clinton recieved funding directly from known or suspected Chinese intelligence agents, among them James and Mochtar Riady who own the Indonesian Lippo Group; John Huang; Charlie Trie; Ted Sioeng; Maria Hsia; Wang Jun and others.”
Basically, the Chinese bought U.S. information on missile and nuclear technology to update its weaponry so that “China can now strike U.S. targets easily from their bases in Panama, Vancouver and the Bahamas,” per Poe.
5. Hillary Clinton’s position as Secretary of State was up for sale through the Clinton Foundation. Chinagate was a precursor to the corruption and sleaze of the Clinton Foundation, where Hillary Clinton’s foreign policy was influenced by foreign donors and governments and undermined America’s national security by doing so. The Daily Wire has the details of it here.
6. Ted Kennedy offered to help the Soviet Union undermine President Ronald Reagan’s policies. The former Massachusetts senator proposed to help established interviews between Moscow and various American TV outlets in order to make the Soviet Union’s “peaceful intentions” well-known. Kennedy hoped that this would weaken Reagan’s foreign policy toward the Soviet Union; hence setting up an opening for Kennedy to challenge Reagan in 1984. While it may not be known if the Soviet Union ever took up Kennedy’s proposal, what Kennedy did was far worse than what Flynn did, as Mark Levin explained on his Monday radio show.
7. Bowe Bergdahl. During the summer of 2014, the Obama administration announced that it had swapped five terrorists from Guatanamo Bay in exchange for Sgt. Bowe Bergdahl, who was being held by the Taliban. Shortly thereafter, allegations surfaced that Bergdahl had deserted his unit in 2009 for the Taliban and American soldiers had died in their attempts to find him, although the exact number is unclear. Bergdahl is currently facing charges of “desertion and misbehavior before the enemy.” Meanwhile, it is believed that the five terrorists that were traded for Bergdahl have attempted to re-enter terrorism, meaning that the Obama administration allowed five terrorists the opportunity to go back into action in exchange for an American solider charged with desertion.
Follow Aaron Bandler on Twitter @bandlersbanter.