Editing Iran–Contra affair (section)

===Subsequent dealings===
On 26 July 1986, [[Hezbollah]] freed the US hostage Father [[Lawrence Jenco]], former head of [[Catholic Relief Services]] in Lebanon.{{sfn|Kornbluh|Byrne|1993|p=250}} Following this, [[William J. Casey]], head of the CIA, requested that the US authorize sending a shipment of small missile parts to Iranian military forces as a way of expressing gratitude.{{sfn|Reagan|1990|p=523}} Casey also justified this request by stating that the contact in the Iranian government might otherwise lose face or be executed, and hostages might be killed. Reagan authorized the shipment to ensure that those potential events would not occur.{{sfn|Reagan|1990|p=523}} North used this release to persuade Reagan to switch over to a "sequential" policy of freeing the hostages one by one, instead of the "all or nothing" policy that the Americans had pursued until then.{{sfn|Kornbluh|Byrne|1993|p=250}} By this point, the Americans had grown tired of Ghorbanifar who had proven himself a dishonest intermediary who played off both sides to his own commercial advantage.{{sfn|Kornbluh|Byrne|1993|p=250}} In August 1986, the Americans had established a new contact in the Iranian government, Ali Hashemi Bahramani, the nephew of Rafsanjani and an officer in the Revolutionary Guard.{{sfn|Kornbluh|Byrne|1993|p=250}} The fact that the Revolutionary Guard was deeply involved in international terrorism seemed only to attract the Americans more to Bahramani, who was seen as someone with the influence to change Iran's policies.{{sfn|Kornbluh|Byrne|1993|p=250}} [[Richard Secord]], a US arms dealer, who was being used as a contact with Iran, wrote to North: "My judgment is that we have opened up a new and probably better channel into Iran".{{sfn|Kornbluh|Byrne|1993|p=250}} North was so impressed with Bahramani that he arranged for him to secretly visit [[Washington DC]] and gave him a guided tour at midnight of the White House.{{sfn|Kornbluh|Byrne|1993|p=250}}

North frequently met with Bahramani in the summer and autumn of 1986 in West Germany, discussing arms sales to Iran, the freeing of hostages held by Hezbollah and how best to overthrow President [[Saddam Hussein]] of Iraq and the establishment of "a non-hostile regime in Baghdad".{{sfn|Kornbluh|Byrne|1993|p=250}} In September and October 1986, three more Americans—Frank Reed, Joseph Cicippio, and Edward Tracy—were abducted in Lebanon by a separate terrorist group, who referred to them simply as "G.I. Joe", after the popular US toy. The reasons for their abduction are unknown, although it is speculated that they were kidnapped to replace the freed Americans.{{sfn|Ranstorp|1997|pp=98–99}} One more original hostage, David Jacobsen, was later released. The captors promised to release the remaining two, but the release never happened.{{sfn|Reagan|1990|pp=526–527}}

During a secret meeting in Frankfurt in October 1986, North told Bahramani that: "Saddam Hussein must go".{{sfn|Kornbluh|Byrne|1993|p=250}} North also claimed that Reagan had told him to tell Bahramani that: "Saddam Hussein is an asshole."{{sfn|Kornbluh|Byrne|1993|p=250}} Behramani during a secret meeting in Mainz informed North that Rafsanjani "for his own politics [...] decided to get all the groups involved and give them a role to play".{{sfn|Kornbluh|Byrne|1993|p=251}} Thus, all the factions in the Iranian government would be jointly responsible for the talks with the Americans and "there would not be an internal war".{{sfn|Kornbluh|Byrne|1993|p=251}} This demand of Behramani caused much dismay on the US side as it made clear to them that they would not be dealing solely with a "moderate" faction in the Islamic Republic but rather with all the factions in the Iranian government—including those who were very much involved in terrorism.{{sfn|Kornbluh|Byrne|1993|p=251}} Despite this, the talks were not broken off.{{sfn|Kornbluh|Byrne|1993|p=251}}