PRESIDENT ADMITS AIDING GUERRILLAS AGAINST NICARAGUA

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP90-00965R000201020044-2
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 2
• Document Creation Date: December 22, 2016
• Document Release Date: January 25, 2012
• Sequence Number: 44
• Publication Date: April 15, 1983
• Content Type: OPEN SOURCE

la Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2012/01/25: CIA-RD P90-00965R000201020044-2
ATTIC]
WASHINGTON POST
15 APP'L 1983
President Admits.
Aiding Guerrillas
ainst Nicaragua
By Lou Cannon
and Patrick E. Tyler
Washington Post Staff Writers
President Reagan yesterday ac-
knowledged U.S. support of anti-
government guerrillas in Nicaragua
but said his administration was
"complying fully" with a congression-
al prohibition on activities aimed at
overthrowing Nicaragua's leftist San-
dinista regime.
"Anything we're doing in that area
is simply trying to interdict the sup-
ply lines which are supplying the
[leftist] guerrillas in El Salvador,"
the president said at a brief news
conference. `But the'picture today is
that Nicaragua, with its protests that
somehow someone is trying to over-
throw them, is, as a revolutionary
government, trying to overthrow the
govr@rnment , of ... El Salvador
A high administration official said
later that "part of the interdiction"
was the use of sophisticated Air-
borne Warning and Control System
(AWACS) aircraft to spy on air traf-
fic in and out of Nicaragua. The
planes, based at Tinker Air Force
Base, Okla., are refueled in midair
over Mexico and are blanketing Nic-
aragua with radar surveillance from
the safety of international waters in
the Pacific, officials said.
While Reagan publicly insisted in
the White House briefing room that
his administration is obeying the law
in Central America, Secretary of
State George P. Shultz and national
security adviser William P. Clark
were making the some argument in
the Capitol to Rep. Edward P.
Roland (D-Mass.), chairman of the
House Permanent Select Committee
on Intelligence.
Boland is the author of an amend-
ment bearing his name that prohib-
its U.S. assistance "for the purpose"
of overthrowing the Nicaraguan gov-
ernment or provoking military con-
flict between Nicaragua and neigh-
boring Honduras.
The 35-minute meeting was de-
scribed by administration officials as
"a good, friendly consultation on our
policy in El Salvador and Nicaragua"
in which Boland did not assert that
the Reagan government is violating
the law. They described Boland as
"cordial and non-committal, as we
expected."
But a congressional source said
Roland "expressed a very serious
amount of concern" among commit-
tee members about whether the ad-
ministration was complying with, the law.
"I don't think it was a meeting to change
anyone's position," the source said.
Each side listened carefully to the op-
posing concerns and agreed at the end of
.,the meeting that Shultz would return
Wednesday to testify before the full com-
mittee in closed session. Clark does not
plan to testify, in keeping with what the
White House described as a long tradi-
tion.
Reagan made his comments on Central
America at a news conference called to
celebrate the Senate confirmation of
Kenneth L. Adelman as direotor of the
Arms Control and Disarmament Agency.
But reporters ignored that- announce-
ment and all their questions except one
were about administration policy in Cen-
tral America.
. The president, after first saying he
couldn't say anything except, that the
administration was "complying with the
law," launched a vigorous defense of his
policy and an attack on the "completely
Marxist" government of Nicaragua.
"We are not doing anything to try, and
overthrow the' Nicaraguan .government,"
Reagan said. "~ .. Nicaragua today has
created the biggest military force in all of
Central America and large parts of South
.America=an' army of some 25,000
backed.by a milita of 50,000, armed with
Soviet weapons that consist of heavy--'
duty tanks, an air force, helicopter gun
ships, fighter planes, bombers and so
forth ......
Reagan said this Nicaraguan armed
force was opposed by a few thousand
Miskito Indians and ' guerrillas land
added, "I don't think it's reasonable to
`assume that that kind of a force could
nurse any ambitions that they can over-
throw that government with that great
military force."
In previous intelligence and State De-
partment reports, the administration has
never asserted that the Nicaraguans pos-
sess an air force of any significance. The
air force is mainly a few old trainers and
civilian propeller planes, although Nic-
aragua has received modern artillery and
heavy tanks from Cuba and the Soviet
Union, according to these reports.
Reagan attempted to turn around. crit-
icism that the United States is support-
ing efforts to overthrow the leftist Ni-
caraguan government by insisting Nic-
aragua is trying to overthrow the elected
government of _El Salvador by supplying
arms to leftist insurgents. The president
hinted that he would take action to pre-
vent this if permitted, but. said "what I
might personally wish or what our gov-
ernment might wish still would not jus-
tify us violating the law of the land."
White House, counselor Edwin Meese
III also reflected, administration unhap-
piness with the Boland amendment at a
breakfast meeting with' reporters. He
said, "It is the responsibility of the pres-
ident to conduct foreign policy; limita-
tions on that by the' Congress are im-
proper as far as
Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2012/01/25: CIA-RDP90-00965R000201020044-2
 Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2012/01/25: CIA-RDP90-00965R000201020044-2
The administration's point man on
Central American policy, Thomas 0.
Enders, assistant secretary of state for
inter-American affairs, returned to Cap-
itol Hill yesterday to brief the House
Foreign Acfairs Committee and wound
up in a heated,exchange with Rep. Rob-
ert Torricelli (D-N.J.), who was in a fact-
finding group that returned this week
from Nicaragua.
Torricelli accused Enders, who also
attended a portion of the meeting with
Clark, Shultz and Boland, of making "in-
flammatory" charges that the Ni-
caraguans were prepared to accept Soviet
missiles on their soil. Torricelli said End-
ers was using scare tactics to justify a
hardline policy toward Nicaragua. Tor-
ricelli. said that Nicaraguan officials told
him explicitly that they "have no inten-
tion of basing offensive [Soviet] weapons
in Nicaragua."
"Recognize what this Nicaraguan mis-
sile crisis is all about," Torricelli said.
"They are searching for facts to justify a
policy."
Enders defended himself by saying he
was simply repeating what had been re-
ported in news accounts from Managua
based on remarks by the Nicaraguan de-
fense minister. After the hearing, Enders
said, "We were just quoting the Ni-'
caraguan defense minister. Mr. Torricelli
has received a denial. As far as we can
tell, they have not denied it in public, but
it would be very welcome."
Meanwhile, the State Department is-
sued a response to Torricelli's claim on
Wednesday that the U.S. ambassador to
Honduras, John D. Negroponte, had
called the Boland amendment a "legal
triviality." A department spokesman said
Negroponte "flatly denied" making the
statement.
Administration officials said last night
that former senator Richard Stone (D.
Fla.) would be designated "legislative co-
ordinator" in Congress for the adminis- i
tration's Central American policy and
probably would take a trip to the region
next week.
Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2012/01/25: CIA-RDP90-00965R000201020044-2