KISSINGER BACKS COVERT TACTICS

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP90-00552R000303320017-4
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 1
• Document Creation Date: December 22, 2016
• Document Release Date: July 29, 2010
• Sequence Number: 17
• Publication Date: July 20, 1983
• Content Type: OPEN SOURCE

Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2010/07/29: CIA-RDP90-00552R000303320017-4
Kissinger Backs.
Covert Tactics
'Suggests Communist
Regimes Can Be Altered
By OSWALD JOHNSTON,
Tunes Staff Writer
WASHINGTON-Henry A. Xis-
singer, whose appointment as head
.of a bipartisan presidential commis-
sion on CentralAmerica has stirred
predictable outcries romboth-ieft
-and right, -bas -publicly endorsed
U.S.-supported mvertoperations in
Nicaragua and has hinted that mili-
tary aid to Ea.Salvadoe_might have
to be expanded. In a joins Interview -with-Sm
-Daniel P. Moym'han (D-N:Y.) in the
spring issue of public Opinion mag-
azine, the former secretary of stale
said that the need for military aid
should be gauged by what is neces-
sary to do the.- job, not by what
Congress mightallow.
Regarding Nicaragua, he said. -1t
e s c a p e s me why w e have to ..._
assert that any Communist govern-
ment that has established itself can,
never be changed.".He added, bow-.
ever, that the present semipublic
procedure for Bearing U.S. covert
activities through Congress threat-
ens the loss of public support; he
suggested instead an "overt Amen_
can military presence .on the Hon-
duran border" if that is necessary to
block arms shipments to antigov-
ernment guerrillas in El Salvador. .
"I am sympathetic to the covert
operations if we tan still conduct
them the way their name implies,"
Kissinger said. "But if covert opera-
tions have to be justified in a public
debate, they stop being covert and
we will wind zp 4asing public sup-
porL"
77- On aid to El Salvador, he said: ^'I
!.Can understand senators voting
against aid to El Salvador. 'I would
disagree with them, but I can
understand it. I can also understand
supporting an increase in aid. I.
cannot understand the rationale for
cutting it." - . - ,.--
He concluded that the-Adminis-
tration has not yet faced up to what
is needed to prevail in El Salvador,
LOS
20 July 1983
The Administration's program, he sions, including the charge that he
said, "strikes me as having been set engineered the overthrow of Chil.
by 1.s estimate of the maximum can President Salvador Allende.
Congress will appropriate, not a The archconservative Sen. Jesse
strategic or political assessment." Helms (R-N.C.), who heads the
The bottom line of the former Foreign Relations subcommittee on
secretary'a observations was vin- Latin America. said Tuesday that he
tage Kissinger; intends to bring Kissinger before
"If we cannot manage Central the subcommittee for a test of
America, it will be impossible to ideological purity-although Kis-
convince threatened nations in the -singer's appointment needs no Sen-
Persian Gulf and other places that ate confirmation.
we know how to .manage the global "There may - be someone across
equilibrium. We will face a series of this broad land .farther down on say
upheavals that will absorb so'much list of preferences for such,a .posi-
of cur .:energies that, we will be tion than Henry Kissinger -but
dtected from bur previous poll- `can!t thlnkaf him," Helms said,,-.
LbeeabDLlike Him, lbo
Digr.Pointedat Aataretlea'
So', as he steps into his new role as va0wa~ =noti- {
tied by -the traumatic head of the commission :th
presidential Vietnam and Its associations with
on Central .America,-, Kissinger ttheNixonAdministration.have.lso
seems;,virtually certaid to ..study raised achorus of disc d'
Latin- American -pol Cy in terms of
global Mice and sotto succumb to 'Dr,-if`iesinger has lewaivads ,in
Po terms of diplomatic experience or
a regional parochialism of the sort , expertise," t?said Sen. Chriatopher.J.
be -ridiculed .as secretary; of~atate Dodd (D_Conn.), an?outspoken lop=
under Presidents Gerald R. Ford ponent of present policiea?n Central
and Richard M. Nixon and, earlier, America. "But that _experience .has
as White House national security made him a symbol for a foreign
adviser -uader.Nixan. policy many would rather-'forget
His jesting description of the than repeat"
Latin American region as "a dagger Rep.Howard vJolpe (p.Mich.), a
pointed at the heart-of Antarctica" me.of_ Ow House>FlDeeign
is Kissingefs mosememoaable ref-
fairs-~0amaniittee and saotcer..~aut-
erenee to hemispheric policies dur-
'ingbis White House years. spoken `critic - -af , the.Adslstia =
In the Public Opinion interview, .tion's:Central America po.hc:.-raid
ale news conference
Moynihan, who has subsequently- y nba
criticized Reagan ;policies on Cen- co appointment of the e p presidential
l a
tral - America, pretty much agreed commission was "not toi~y to take is with m eringeris assessment that second look at policy.:Bather, it is
Congress should either let the Ad- clear the whole purpose is to mobi-
Iire public _support for a failed
ministration do the job in El Salva- ' policy."
dor or get out altogether. He a said ,-the- commission is"an
"A case can be made for doing effort to co-opt, finesse, idivert at-
notling; and a case can. even be . 'ration" from the failiae of D.S.
made for doing more than the
in -Central America. "The
President asks, but no case can be appointment . policy of
Kissinger is
made .for' doing. 45% of what .he going to to raise Mr. grave-' second
asks," Moyniharrsaid.
ihoughta on the pair aid some
- Tham be the last- sign of sn
~'- ~ .. embers.o# Congress. he acid.
breement non _, any of
these questions until issinger's
commission submits :its report Dec.
l-1, indeed. .anybipartiaanship is'
achievable then. . ~ - . . -
SMce thg-imerview,,the`question
of Central America policy has be-
come`. lrifianied with -partisanship
and . Kissinger is hardly likely to
calm those passions. He is reviled on
the right for having negotiated with
theSoviets and having starred the
process that led to the Panama
Canal treaties and denounced on the
left-for a wide range of transgres-
Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2010/07/29: CIA-RDP90-00552R000303320017-4