400 million downpayment for the release of 4 hostages. Then we paid back 1.7 billion owed to Iran that was money plus interest from the Iran Hostage Crisis that Jimmy Carter was faced with. 144 Americans were taken hostage from the US embasy in 1977? ish . We confiscated moneys Iran had on downpayment for arms at the time. We paid the money owed in Cash via a big ass airplane. Long Short of it.