ENDERS'S END

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP90-00552R000201800001-1
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 1
• Document Creation Date: December 22, 2016
• Document Release Date: July 14, 2010
• Sequence Number: 1
• Publication Date: June 27, 1983
• Content Type: OPEN SOURCE

Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2010/07/14: CIA-RDP90-00552R000201800001-1
?3i FAG
Nr+ REPUBLIC
27 June 198~STAT
VV'HITE HOUSE WATCH --
ENDERS'S END
T F REPLACEMENT of Thomas Enders as the State
Department's top policymaker for Latin America and
of Deane Hinton as ambassador to El Salvador have been
portrayed as part of a move to "toughen" U.S. policy on
Central America, as a power grab by the White House
national security adviser, William Clark, at the expense of
Secretary of State George Shultz, and as a triumph of
hardliners such as U.N. Ambassador Dane Kirkpatrick
and C.I.A. Director William Casey over "soft" foreign
service careerists. Actually the -situation is both simpler
than all that and more .complex. Personality differences
played a big part in Enders's sacking. Hinton was not
sacked at all. The personnel changes were not the result of
a change in overall policy toward Central America, but of a
determination by Clark that policy was not being effective.
ly implemented. Clark has not executed a Kissinger-style
power play, though; on the contrary, Enders was ousted
as par, of a Dlan to shift operational control of Central
America policy from the White House back to State. And
at State, the new Assistant Secretary for Latin America,
Langhorne Motley, and the new ambassador in San Salva-
dor, Thomas Pickering, are not noticeably harder-line on
policy than Enders and Hinton were. State's original
choice for the ambassador's job, John Negroponte, a ca-
reer diplomat who is currently ambassador to Honduras,
actually was rejected by the White House as having too
hardline a reputation in Congress.
1 NEVERTI-MLESS, the Administration's policy is in-
exorabiv becoming "tougher" as the military situa-
tion in El Salvador deteriorates and that in Nicaragua im-
proves. At least in the short run, the new personnel
changes will do nothing to alter the general drift toward
military solutions. Clark, instinctively hardline, has not
stolen power, but he has demonstrated that he has it.
Shultz, more of a moderate, has vet-to show that he can get
it back. Clark's fellow hardliners, including Kirkpatrick,
had lost-some major policy fights to Enders, but in the end
they won his scalp, and that enhancestheirinfluence. -One
of these days-after the 1984 election, if it can be put off
until then-there may be a decisive struggle over. Central
America within the Administration, probably over wheth-
er or not to send U.S. combat troops or large numbers of
advisers to the region-to win it or stay out. At the mo-
mert, it's iike)v that debate will continue over how best to
v,rn while staving out and how best to handle domestic
opponents of Administration policy-by conciliation and
persuasion or by threat and confrontation.
Thomas Enders 's friends in the State Department and
L
enemies among Democrats on Capitol Hill find it laugh-
able that he should be cast now as some kind of dove. Ten
years ago, as No. 2 mar. in the U.S. embassy in Phnom
Penh, Enders selected targets for secret U.S. bombing
raids in Cambodia, earning the respectful notice of Alex-
ander Haig, then chief of staff to President Nixon. As
Ronald Reagan's first Secretary of State, Haig intended to
pursue a high-tension policy.against.Latin American Com-
munists, and he selected Enders to help carry out his aims
eyen though Enders had no prior Latin -experience. (He
has since become fluent in Spanish, no mean feat while
working sixteen-hour days as a policy . manager.) Haig
originally wanted a direct confrontation with Cuba, the
"source" -of trouble in Central America, but the Adminis-
tration instead chose quieter options--covert aid to anti-
government guerrillas in Nicaragua and stepped-up mili-
tarp aid to the government of El Salvador. Enders
supported both-.and also backed a process of negotiation
with leftists and pressure for human rights reform in El
Salvador to an extent that aroused suspicion among the
Administration's hardest liners.
E.nders's personal and management style did not en-
dear him to his adversaries. He is an imperious, icy man
who at six foot-eight acts as though he is used to looking
down at other people. One State Department official said,
"If Enders had done the same things he did, but had the
personality of George Shultz, he'd still be here. The Rea-
ganites like to sit around comfortably and talk about
things. You can't do that with Enders present." Enders
also is described as "extremely turf conscious," unwilling
or unable to delegate authority, and disrespectful of other
people's prerogatives. 'The White House felt that Enders,
-not Shultz, was running Latin American policy," one aide
said. "Enders really didn't report to anybody." When
C.1.A. Director Casey wanted State to release new data on
Communist supply lines to El Salvador, Enders sat on the
information and deprecated is as "warmed-over left-
overs." He got it into his head that Spanish Prime Minister
Felipe Gonzales could be brought into Central America
diplomacy and flew off to see him without consulting
anyone, leading the White House to decree that hence-
forth no one travels without permission.
From the standpoint of Enders-'s friends at State and
'elsewhere, the issues over which he was ousted transcend
-style and concern methods of implementing policy. They
say he wanted to conduct it as quietly as possible, so as not
to arouse public and congressional opposition, whereas
;others,-. including -Ambassador Kirkpatrick, wanted to
crystallize issues and confront and defeat the opposition.
Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2010/07/14: CIA-RDP90-00552R000201800001-1