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The October Surprise refers to a conspiracy theory alleging that Ronald Reagan's presidential campaign secretly negotiated with Iran to delay the release of American hostages held in Iran until after the 1980 USA presidential election. This alleged delay was intended to prevent President Jimmy Carter from gaining an "October Surprise" boost in popularity that could have secured his re-election.1
Gary Sick, a former Jimmy Carter administration adviser on Iran, published his book October Surprise, which systematically sifts through the evidence that convinced him the Ronald Reagan camp and Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini did actually make a secret deal.2
Connections to PROMIS Software Scandal
Michael Riconosciuto claimed that he and Earl Brian traveled to Iran in 1980 and paid $40 million to Iranian officials to persuade them not to release the hostages before Ronald Reagan's inauguration. This allegation directly linked the PROMIS Software Scandal to the October Surprise affair, creating a "domino effect" in Washington D.C. and leading to numerous investigations and media attention.1
Danny Casolaro was investigating the October Surprise as part of his broader "The Octopus" probe, believing it was connected to the alleged theft of the INSLAW computer program, PROMIS. Ari Ben-Menashe, a self-proclaimed Israel military intelligence officer, claimed that two Federal Bureau of Investigation agents from Lexington, Kentucky, were disaffected because their superiors had refused to indict high Ronald Reagan officials for their role in the October Surprise.1
Barbara Honegger, a former Ronald Reagan White House aide, authored a book titled October Surprise, in which she alleged that Monzer Al-Kassar heroin smuggling network in Italy was used to launder North Atlantic Treaty Organization arms stocks for diversion to Iran, with the help of corrupt Italy intelligence officials linked to the secretive fascist Masonic lodge, P2.1
Investigations
Both the USA United States House of Representatives and the USA United States Senate began looking into the October Surprise. The full United States Senate voted down a formal investigation, but the Senate Foreign Relations Committee decided to hold limited hearings on the arms-for-hostages deal. The United States House of Representatives, however, funded a full-scale October Surprise Task Force, whose chief counsel was E. Lawrence Barcella, Jr., to investigate Gary Sick and Ari Ben-Menashe allegations, among others.2
An interim report issued by the October Surprise Task Force chairman, Lee Hamilton, on June 30, 1992, concluded that George Bush was in the USA continuously during the October 18-22 time period and did not travel to Paris, France, to participate in the alleged secret meeting. This conclusion was drawn despite the report's assertions that it had interviewed only about 50 out of some 150 potential witnesses and had obtained only a small fraction of the documents it was seeking. Lee Hamilton stated that "all credible evidence" led to the conclusion that George Bush was not in Paris.2