CONGRESS IS ASKED FOR AID TO CONTRAS

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP90-00552R000100390002-8
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 1
• Document Creation Date: December 22, 2016
• Document Release Date: June 22, 2010
• Sequence Number: 2
• Publication Date: January 30, 1985
• Content Type: OPEN SOURCE

Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2010/06/22 : CIA-RDP9O-00552ROO0100390002-8
AQTiri. G APPEAR
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BALTIMORE SUN
30 January 1985
Congress is asked
for aid to `contras'
By Gilbert A. L.ewthwaite
Washington Bureau of The Sun
WASHINGTON - The Reagan
administration yesterday reopened
its campaign for congressional ap-
proval of funds for the "contras"
fighting the Sandinista regime in
Nicaragua, with a key official warn-
ing that continued refusal to back
the guerrillas would be "a serious
mistake."
"I can't guarantee you success,
but if you allow the anti-Sandinistas
to falter, I think you can guarantee
failure for our interests, failure for
democracy, failure for negotiations,
and failure for peace," said Lang-
horne A. Motley, assistant secretary
of state for inter-American affairs.
Mr. Motley's appearance before
the House Western Hemispheric Af-
fairs subcommittee was the first ex-
change in what is likely to be an in-
tense, and perhaps bitter, foreign-
policy debate in the opening weeks
of the new Congress over how to con-
front the Sandinistas. Congress must
decide whether to lift or extend its
ban on funds for the Contras when it
expires in March.
Representative Michael D.
Barnes. the Mar_ylan emocrat who
chaos the panel and has been a con-
stant critic of administration policy
in Nicaragua, said previous pressure
on the Sandinistas including the
mining of Nicaraguan harbors had
failed to promote U.S. interests or
make the leaders m Managua more,
conciliatory.
"It may make some of us feel
good to mine harbors, blow up
bridges, and do whatever we have
done. It may make some people feel
good, I don't know. But it makes a
lot of people not feel good to engage
in this type of activity," said Mr.
Barnes.
Opening the first session this
term, he signaled both continuing op-
position to major elements of U.S.
regional policy and a willingness to
debate controversial issues. He said
he found policy toward Nicaragua
"particularly disturbing," although
he remained "open-minded" on ways
of protecting U.S. interests without
resorting to "secret wars."
Mr. Motley siiestepped a ques-
tion from Mr. Barnes on what alter.
GG It makes a lot
of people notfeel good
.to engage in this type
o, j _ictLvity."
MICHAEL D. BARNES
native policies to supporting covert
war the administration had formu-
lated for Nicaragua. Instead, he re-
called that a year ago there was con-
siderable skepticism on Capitol Hill
about increased aid for El Salvador,
and said there were "striking simi-
larities" between that debate and
the controversy over funding for the
contras. Congress, he noted, had
eventually approved the aid for El
Salvador.
"Today there is a new debate, and
a new decision [to be made]. The
doomsdayers say Congress will walk
away from the problem, but I don't
accept that judgment.... I may be
naive, but I am not prepared to ac-
cept that we cannot figure out some
way to work these things out.... I
look forward to more sessions" with
the committee, said Mr. Motley. -
"I am sure we will have them,"
said Mr. Barnes.
Mr. Motley argued that it was
U.S. support for the contras that
persuaded the Sandinistas that they
had "something to bargain for."
"Nobody bargains for something
he expects to get free," he said. "If
the Nicaraguans in the armed resist-
ance are abandoned, why should the
Sandinistas negotiate with them?"
Three expert witnesses - Wil-
liam D. Rogers, assistant secretary
of state for inter-American affairs in
the Ford administration, Abraham
F.. Lowenthal, professor of interna-
tional relations at the University of
Southern California, and Norman A.
Bailey, a former National Security
Council staffer - agreed that coer-
cion was a legitimate diplomatic
tool but asserted that in Nicaragua it
was now likely to be counterproduc-
tive. They argued for more diplo-
matic and economic initiatives in
the region from the U.S.
STAT
Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2010/06/22 : CIA-RDP9O-00552ROO0100390002-8