Iran–Contra affair: U.S. President Ronald Reagan announces the members of what will become known as the Tower Commission.

The Iran–Contra affair, also referred to as the Iran–Contra scandal, the Iran Initiative, or simply Iran–Contra, was a political scandal in the United States that centered on arms trafficking to Iran between 1981 and 1986, facilitated by senior officials of the Ronald Reagan administration. As Iran was subject to an arms embargo at the time of the scandal, the sale of arms was deemed illegal. The administration hoped to use the proceeds of the arms sale to fund the Contras, an anti-Sandinista rebel group in Nicaragua. Under the Boland Amendment, passed by Congress in a 411–0 vote and signed into law by Reagan, further funding of the Contras by legislative appropriations was prohibited by Congress, but the Reagan administration continued funding them secretively using non-appropriated funds.

Ronald Wilson Reagan was an American politician and actor who served as the 40th president of the United States from 1981 to 1989. A member of the Republican Party, he became an important figure in the American conservative movement. The period encompassing his presidency is known as the Reagan era.

The Tower Commission was a United States presidential commission established on December 1, 1986, by President Ronald Reagan in response to the Iran–Contra affair. The commission, composed of former Senator John Tower of Texas, former Secretary of State Edmund Muskie, and former National Security Advisor Brent Scowcroft, was tasked with reviewing the proper role of the National Security Council staff in national security operations generally, and in the arms transfers to Iran specifically.