Iran Official Claims U.S. Republicans Asked to Delay Prisoner Release Until After Presidential Election

[Crazy Eddie]

Why should the Iranians do that? What was in it for them?

We'd sell them weapons, and use the funds to then make America Great Again™.

Pretty much this. If this is true, the most likely scenario is that Iran-Contra was Reagan's attempt to reward the Iranians for cooperating with his October Surprise. Basically, they did him a favor by prolonging the negotiations and he did them a favor by selling them the weapons and parts they needed to keep their American-Made military equipment functional. A deal which actually would have been VERY important to Iran in light of hostilities with Saddam.

 

[Jayjay]

We'd sell them weapons, and use the funds to then make America Great Again™.

Pretty much this. If this is true, the most likely scenario is that Iran-Contra was Reagan's attempt to reward the Iranians for cooperating with his October Surprise. Basically, they did him a favor by prolonging the negotiations and he did them a favor by selling them the weapons and parts they needed to keep their American-Made military equipment functional. A deal which actually would have been VERY important to Iran in light of hostilities with Saddam.

But this time around, that seems rather unlikely. The republican candidates are strongly critical of Obama being too soft with Iran and rest of the world in general.

 

[Crazy Eddie]

Pretty much this. If this is true, the most likely scenario is that Iran-Contra was Reagan's attempt to reward the Iranians for cooperating with his October Surprise. Basically, they did him a favor by prolonging the negotiations and he did them a favor by selling them the weapons and parts they needed to keep their American-Made military equipment functional. A deal which actually would have been VERY important to Iran in light of hostilities with Saddam.

But this time around, that seems rather unlikely. The republican candidates are strongly critical of Obama being too soft with Iran and rest of the world in general.

It isn't Obama they'd try that with, it's Hillary. I've heard more and more people speculating that the "capture" scare with the patrol boats was an attempt by some Republican operative to engineer a hostage crisis they could then use to make Democrats IN GENERAL look weak; possibly the boats were ordered onto that mission by someone in the chain of command with close political/career ties to the RNC leadership (which would, in fact, explain why a pair of small craft that are normally used for patrolling rivers and lakes wound up wandering around the ocean in Iranian territorial waters; that is literally the only place in the world those boats SHOULDN'T have been).

 

[Bronzeage]

Why should the Iranians do that? What was in it for them?

Iran is desperate to reenter the world market and can't do so until it makes a deal with the US. They have had to contend with hardliners inside their country, who want to derail the deal, and hardliners in this country who want the same. The GOP has tried to torpedo the deal many times and has dragged out the process at least a year longer than necessary.

There is probably some real animosity toward GOP politicians among the Iranians.

 

[laughing dog]

Pretty much this. If this is true, the most likely scenario is that Iran-Contra was Reagan's attempt to reward the Iranians for cooperating with his October Surprise. Basically, they did him a favor by prolonging the negotiations and he did them a favor by selling them the weapons and parts they needed to keep their American-Made military equipment functional. A deal which actually would have been VERY important to Iran in light of hostilities with Saddam.

But this time around, that seems rather unlikely. The republican candidates are strongly critical of Obama being too soft with Iran and rest of the world in general.

Um, Reagan made the same sort of observations about Carter.