IN THE LAND OF THE LEAK

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP90-00965R000201030001-8
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 7
• Document Creation Date: December 22, 2016
• Document Release Date: January 19, 2012
• Sequence Number: 1
• Publication Date: March 29, 1987
• Content Type: OPEN SOURCE

ST"T
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With Iranscam at full boll,
in search of the truth.
29 March 1987
In
the Lind of
the Leak
"Well, Peter,
we finally talk
M
after so many years."
The voice on the telephone that day in June last year was
cultured, with the faint accent of someone who had learned
English from a British tutor. The greeting was one any
editor would have excised, as a tired cliche, from the
manuscript of a novel about foreign intrigue.
The voice belonged to Albert Hakim, a Los Gatos busi-
nessman about whom I ha-S mtten~occasionally for more
than five years. I had never spoken to him. Our one pre-
vious exchange had been conducted through a secretary,
who took my questions to him and scribbled down his
cryptic answers, calling me with them later. Hakim was
not exactly a mystery man; he was merely cautious. In his
business-security and intelligence systems-he seemed to
believe that the press could only do him harm. How right
he was.
This call came several months before the Iran-Contra
scandal broke like a thunderbolt last November, disclosing
among other things that Hakim was a central figure in the
Reagan administration's secret foreign policy initiatives.
Although Hakim expressed amazement at allegations he
was helping the Contras, when he called me he had been
secretly helping the Reagan administration ship arms to
Iran. Former National Security Council director Robert
McFarlane had made his ill-fated trip to Tehran. The Reagan
administration and the CIA had begun dealing with the
Iranian government throw m's own set of interme-
diaries. And for two years Hakim had handled the Swiss
bank accounts for the Contra war against Nicaragua. The
U.S. Senate Select Committee on Intelligence later reported
that Hakim and his partner, retired Air Force Maj. Gen.
Richard V. Secord, believed they were doing "the Lord's
work" with their pro-Contra activities.
Hakim didn't bring up the Lord, or the Iranians. in our
brief conversation. I'd called him to ask about a lawsuit
filed in Miami by a group called the Christic Institute. The
suit claimed Hakim and a number of former U.S. intelli-
9 agents were part of an arms-dealing ring that dated
ack to the 1960s. Occasionally, according to the suit,
IA-RDP90-00965R000201030001-8
members of the ring-though not Hakim-had indulged in
political assassinations. Recently they had sent explosives
and weapons to "freedom fighters" in Nicaragu
Among other things, the suit reflected a belief, deeply
held in some circles, that a "Shadow CIA" exists and that
people like Hakim belong to it. The Shadow CIA supposedly
performs secret operations overseas, exercising an unhealthy,
secret influence over U.S. foreign policy.
"When this guy [Hakim] surfaces, there's going to be a
big bright light on him," Daniel Sheehan, director of the
Christic Institute, had told me on the telephone. The insti-
tute is an off-beat Washington public-interest law firm.
Sheehan has worked on several sensational cases, including
the Karen Silkwood case and a lawsuit against Nazis in
Greensboro, N.C.?
Before the Iranscam revela.
tions, the prevailing opinion
among reporters I knew was that
the Christic Institute lawsuit had
been cooked up by someone who
had read too many conspiracy
books. Who could believe the
Reagan administration would
have anything to do with these
people, risking all on behalf of
the Contras and imaginary Irani-
an "moderates"?
Hakim categorically denied the
allegations made by the lawsuit.
"When I heard about this thing, I
thought they were kidding me,
joking with me," he said. "They
said no, this is true."
Hakim said he had decided that
"this is really a political lawsuit,
basically focusing on the presi-
dent's support of the freedom
fighters, trying to discredit his ac-
tivities. This is my opinion. As far
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as my involvement is concerned,
I can only guess how I got into
something I know nothing about
or have anything to do with."
Hakim concluded: "I have no
idea how my name got into it.
There's no merit to the suit." He
paused. "I haven't had any deep
interest to follow up on this," he
said, somewhat vaguely. "I will
when the time comes. In my
opinion it may even die away if
they can see they cannot stop this
help to the Nicaraguans."
A FEW MONTHS AFTER THAT
call, Hakim phoned again
and said he wanted to tell
the other side of the story.
There had been more news
stories about the lawsuit and in-
creased pressure on the Contra
pipeline. The Miami Herald, for
example, was breaking one story
after another about the private
network resupplying the Contras.
Other publications had made
some interesting discoveries
about the Swiss financial firm Ha-
kim used, and about his business
partner Secord's involvement in
buying an airplane for the Con-
tras. Here and there a few small
stories had appeared mentioning
an obscure lieutenant colonel
named Oliver North who seemed
to be playing a secret role in the
National Security Council.
Hakim said, "There are some
things you should know about
these people"-meaning the
ones who had filed the suit. He
didn't say what he knew, but the
tone of his voice suggested that it
wasn't good. He was going to be
at his hilltop home in Los Gatos
in a week or two, and we agreed
to meet. That was our last con-
versation. A few days later, three American
mercenaries were shot down over Nicaragua
in a C-133 cargo plane that was carrying weap-
ons and ammunition to the Contras. The survi-
vor, Eugene Hasenfus, said he thought he was
working for the CIA.
A reporter got hold of telephone records and
found some U.S. phone numbers that had been
called repeatedly from the fliers' "safe house"
in Ilopango, El Salvador. One was for Lt. Col.
Oliver North in the White House. Another was
for Hakim's company, Stanford Technology
Trading Group International Inc., which has
offices in San Jose and a suburb of Washington.
In November, the Iran arms scandal broke,
and with it came revelations about a private
foreign policy network under the nominal
direction of the National Security Council. Albert
Hakim's name began appearing regularly in
the world's newspapers, linked with a cast of
characters that might be called "Ollie's Secret
Army." The cast included many of the people
cited in the Christic Institute lawsuit, though
Oliver North hadn't been named in the suit.
The Big Eastern Newspapers were dominat-
ing the story, so Knight-Ridder, the parent
company of the Mercury News, decided to form
a pool of reporters to do in-depth coverage of
the affair. Partly because Hakim was from the
San Jose area, and maybe because I'd had
some success before in covering a scandal
involving a president (Ferdinand Marcos of
the Philippines), I was assigned to the Wash-
ington bureau in December. I thought maybe I
could reach Hakim at his company's Virginia
office or land an interview with one of his
assistants. Also, it seemed like a good opportu-
nity to visit the Christic Institute and find out
how its suit was related to the new scandal.
WHEN I ARRIVED, WASHINGTON WAS
wrapped in a bitter chill and I was
wrapped like a Californian, in a
thin sweater. I proceeded directly
to the home of Daniel Sheehan of the Christic
Institute. Because his lawsuit named so many
Iran-Contra figures as defendants, I figured he
might be able to tell me more about them. His
warm house danced with activity: His two
boys and their neighborhood playmates spilled
through the living room.
The phone jangled inces-
santly and his wife, Sara,
somehow fielded the calls,
many of them from insis-
tent reporters, and fixed
lunch for the children at
the same time.
Sheehan mixed a huge
quantity of tuna and may-
onnaise in a bowl and
made himself two thick
sandwiches. Then he
glanced meaningfully at
the walls and ceiling to
where, presumably, the
NSC and CIA had hidden their microphones,
and invited me out of this warmth onto his
snow-encrusted back porch. For the next few
hours I shivered in my thin sweater while he
recounted the tale of intrigue and deceit in
U.S. foreign policy that his lawsuit is based on.
The suit was prompted by the May 30, 1984,
bombing of a press conference held at La
Penca, Nicaragua, by Eden Pastora, known
popularly as "Commander Zero." Pastora-
commander of the "Southern Front" against
the Nicaraguan government-was locked in a
struggle with another Contra faction that had
the support of the CIA. At the press confer-
ence, someone smuggled in a bomb in a pho-
tographer's suitcase and left it near the front
of the room. It blew up, killing or injuring
many people.
"They made the mistake of bombing the
journalists," Sheehan declared. "The journal-
ists take great umbrage at that. They are going
to find out who did it."
Sheehan's client, a free-lance reporter named
Tony Avirgan, was injured. An investigation by
Avirgan and his wife, Martha Honey, led them
to suspect U.S. involvement in the bombing.
Their suspicions flowered-with Sheehan's
help-into the lawsuit. The suit, explained
Sheehan, was frankly political in nature.
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"It's basically about the total cnminai viola-
tions that are involved in the Contras and their tion'?" . I suggested.
American supporters mounting an undeclared No, he replied.
war against the government of Nicaragua, and "Or 'a source familiar with the investiga-
what the legal implications of that really are," tion'?"
he said. Definitely not, he said.
Close questioning revealed he didn't want to
But Sheehan claimed that the Contra war
was just the latest in a series of covert opera- be called "close to the investigation" because
tions that began in the early 1960s with the he wasn't. This cautious leaker knew nothing
U.S. secret war against Fidel Castro. The more than the average Washingtonian about
agents who cut their teeth on that war were the Iran-Contra affair. He had perfected the
now helping run the Contra war, he asserted. leakless leak.
The "whole thing" began when Nixon was on And there was the Saudi businessman, a
the National Security Council in 1960, Shee- counselor of sorts to kings and presidents,
han said. "Nixon was responsible for Cuba. He who had a deeply personal reason for leaking
chaired a task force to work up a plan of what what he knew about U.S.-Saudi dealings touch-
to do to get Fidel Castro out of Cuba. He ing on the Iran-Contra affair. His leaks were
bwhat was a Contra war against Cuba." carried on the front pages of most of the major
began
The operation, Sheehan continued, eventu- newspapers, each of which referred to him as
a Cbally joined together the CIA, Mafia drug smug- Ta California f he told businessman.
es "Don't refer to me as a
glers, former Cuban gamFIing czars and pro- California businessman. I don't want to be
Batista Cubans in an effort to rid Cuba of called that anymore. That cover is is wearing a
Castro. The agents in this failed mission relo- cacat thin." He haoffice veer ari s
I
cated in Laos after the assassination of John F.
Kennedy. There, they worked with opium suggested: "How about 'Washington business-
smugglers to form an anti-Viet Cong army. man'?" "Fine," he replied.
Later, the group re-emerged in Iran, where it There was plenty of double-dealing, too.
conducted anti-terrorist One day I encouraged a congressional staffer
activities, was active in the to take some information he had to the inde-U.S. defense secret counsel appointed to investigate the
equipsalement of to the Shah, Iran-Contra mess. "Great idea," he said. Just
equipment me back if they decide to make it part of
1a9d so on. accorNoww, in the their investigation, I asked. The information
according to Shee- got to the counsel, but the story went to one of
han, it it is helping wage war r the Big Eastern Papers instead. I was angry,
against Nicaragua, dis- suspecting I'd been had. I called him every
ation using atio ed aprivate "private"
money. one. day for two weeks, but he never called back.
group, conclud- "Well, so what else is new?" an experienced
The ghe explosives Washington hand asked when I told him of
ed, sed to supplied the La Pen- how I'd been had. "In Washington, no one
u
ca press conference. His returns telephone calls from reporters. The
suit was based on inside town is teeming with them. You have to fight
information, he said. them off with a stick."
One
The story is fascinating, but like much that is day I met with Robert K. Brown, the
editor of Soldier of Fortune magazine, in the
reported in Washington, it is based on many
confidential sources who have yet to step for- home of a staff member in Bethesda. Brown, a
ward and be named. Until they do, there is no commanding figure with calculating eyes that
testing its veracity. And sources are as common seemed to be keeping a running total of the
-_, , __?_
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in
REPORTERS DON'T REPORT IN WASHINGTON, --'~ --5 "` '-vtlee gnu uetaea
the Philadelphia Inquirer's Jonathan questions. He was familiar with some of the finer
inter-
Neumann told me. "They big of the Christie lawsuit and was also inter-
carry g ested in a Ghana coup plot I'd written about. He
buckets around and collect leaks." took my card and said one of his reporters would
The leak from a confidential source and the call. Frank Greve, the Knight-Ridder bureau re-
story that reports it are the warp and woof of porter who'd invited me to the meeting, asked
Washington journalism. Leakers push their about Brown's involvement with some boats that
points of view; they leak things damaging to were being used in Central America to run equip-
their enemies, advantageous to their bosses ment to the Contras.
and friends. The press's dependence on such "Can't anybody keep their mouth shut?" barked
leaks has helped make the Iran-Contra story so Brown, vexed that the secret was out.
confusing. The answer is no, not in Washington, of all
Leaking is such a well-defined form of self- places. Maybe even Brown can't: As we were leav-
enhancement that some virtuoso leakers have ing, another reporter sat on the living room couch
begun to leak abstractly. For example, a coun- waiting for his turn with Brown. Apparently
sel to one subcommittee had been used as a Brown was scheduling back-to-back interviews.
source for nearly a month by a reporter I I woke up each morning, leaned out the door of
knew when I stumbled onto him myself. The my apartment and picked up the day's Washington
fellow volunteered various observations on the Post from the hallway carpet. The Post never failed
progress of the Senate investigation of the its readers: Each day, some source had told the
Iran-Contra affair, all with the understanding Post of another White House shocker. In Wash-
that he be quoted only as "a congressional -
source."
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 Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for
ington, it you've got a story to leak, you tell it to
the Post, or perhaps to The New York Times. Those
are the leaks you can read the next morning at
your breakfast table.
There is a hierarchy to this, however. The ur-
gent, aggressive and speculative leaks seem to
wind up in the Post, while the Times appears to be
the vehicle for "leaks of record." For example, a
virtual blizzard of leaks in the Post preceded the
release of the report of the Senate Select Commit-
tee on intelligence, and just when it seemed as if
there was nothing left to leak, a whole section of
the report was printed in its entirety by the Times.
I began each day wonderin if I had wandered
accidentally into a purgatory for reporters, where
the competition always had the story you were just
starting to think about doing.
It was only on my way to work, in the crowded
Metro subway train, that I was reminded that
Washington is a town of government workers and
bureaucrats, for whom administration scandals
are as inevitable as changing weather-but less
relevant to their daily lives and work. The scandal
barely existed for the tall, bearded man immersed
in a Chinese language workbook, or for the young
man and woman discussing the agenda of a morn-
ing meeting at the Agriculture Department, or for
the older man thumbing through a draft budget
for some minor government agency, or for the two
office workers complaining about their imperious
new boss.
One night, snow began swirling furiously from
the sky, and the city slowly ground to a halt. The
Metro trains stopped. The schools closed. Finally
the government itself closed, immobilized by a few
inches of snow. And thus covered with a white
blanket, the capital looked as innocent as a chil-
dren's playground. The sudden snows of January
had done more to paralyze Washington, by shut-
ting down the Metro, than the Iran-Contra scandal
ever did even at its height.
Sometimes, wearied by all the convoluted politics,
I stole away to my favorite refuge. A few blocks
from the Knight-Ridder bureau is a time tunnel.
It's called the National Gallery of Art. Somewhere
near its center is a Madonna and Child With Angels
by a 15th-century master painter from Bruges,
Hans Memling. A painter who depicted order and
balance, Memling has a great appeal to anyone
tired of the busy buzz of sources. There, in th.
- _?6. --_ .. && V LCUIam met
weekday calm of the museum, Memling will transport anyone Watergate" and a much larger conspir-
who asks back to the 15th century through his painting-and, acy began to unfold. A similar thing
through his subject matter, to the first century, when there was happened, Ellsberg said, on the day At-
only one Source and angels announced the news. torney General Edwin Meese revealed
NO MATTER HOW TOUGH THE COMPETITION GOT, ONE THING
was left relatively untouched by the media: the Christic
Institute lawsuit. Sheehan's complex brief and affidavit
was quarried by any number of reporters interested in
the background of the Iran-Contra figures, but the suit itself was
avoided like the pox by the major media. One problem was the
serious nature of the allegations in the suit. Iranscam, for all the
huffing and puffing, seemed to be just a bureaucratic scandal in
which a few functionaries would lose their jobs and write
best-selling memoirs. The lawsuit, on the other hand, alleged
that some of the same characters had been involved in bomb-
ings and wholesale lawbreaking.
The lawsuit relied on more than 80 sources, some of whom
were acquainted and jokingly referred to one another by num-
ber when they met.
Source 00 (I'm not using his real number to protect his
identity) was living in a duplex in Arlington, a $14 taxi ride from
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?.~.,a. rress nuumng. HL' opened a beer. "I hear you
know something about Bill Cottrell," he began. Nope, I said, I
don't. He frowned. Source 00 was annoyed, but he handed me
the beer anyway.
Apparently someone had oversold me for his own benefit,
telling Source 00 I was an expert on Cottrell, an engineer from
Los Gatos who had been killed by terrorists in 1976 in Tehran.
Cottrell worked for several years at the "Blue Cube"-the Air
Force Satellite Test Center in Sunnyvale, a monolithic blue
building off Highway 101 that houses a command and control
center for American spy satellites. In 1976 he was assigned to
the top-secret IBEX project in Iran, and had been gunned down
one August morning in Tehran on his way to work. Source 00
thinks Cottrell may have been gathering information about U.S.
corruption there. Alleged corruption in Iran plays a part in the
Christic suit's allegations about some of the defendants.
Source 00 wouldn't talk for the record or share his evidence,
but he voiced his conviction that a handful of people, many of
whom had worked in Iran for the U.S. government or in private
business during the
1970s, were still exer-
cising an unhealthy in-
fluence over U.S. for-
eign policy.
"In my opinion, after
10 years studying this
bunch of clowns, they
have used people in the
Department of Defense,
the Agency [i.e., the
CIA] and the White
House as their inner
circle and to get these
people to do things. It
sounds like an awful lot
of people, but there's
really just 20 to 25.
They have kept people in key government agencies so nobody
can penetrate their network. It's a combination of private gain
and covert operations that there is no funding for in Congress,
and they are running their own little foreign policy."
SO MANY COMPARISONS WERE BEING MADE BETWEEN WATER-
gate and the Iran-Contra crisis, that I listened with
interest as Daniel Ellsberg talked of Watergate and Iran-
scam over lunch with several folks at the Capitol Deli.
Years earlier, Ellsberg had given The New York Times the
Pentagon Papers; the office of his psychiatrist in California had
been broken into by President Nixon's White House "plumb-
ers." That fateful burglary,
that money from the secret Iran arms
trade had been given to the Contras.
"That's when Iran met Contragate," he
said, and the Contra war became linked
to a White House scandal. He spent the
next half hour telling Watergate stories.
It occurred to me how strange this
country has become. Figures like Ellsberg
have replaced the old soldiers of another
era. We listen with fascination to the vet-
erans of our internecine political battles,
and our historical turning points are no
longer great wars, but tawdry scandals.
b"
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HIGH ON MOST LISTS OF SUSPECTED
members of the alleged "Shad-
ow CIA," is Theodore G. Shack-
ley, former associate director of
operations for the CIA. Shackley left the
agency in 1979; he was later linked to
renegade CIA agent Edwin P. Wilson,
who is now serving a lengthy federal
prison term for selling explosives to
Libyan terrorists. No wrongdoing on
Shackley's part ever was demonstrated,
however. In 1981, he published The
Third Option: An Ameri-
can View of Counter In-
surgency Operations.
Former CIA Director
William Casey, a reput-
ed lover of covert oper-
ations, is said to respect
Shackley highly. In
1976, Shackley worked
under George Bush,
when Bush was direc-
tor of the CIA. A mem-
ber of Bush's vice-presi-
dential staff once
worked under Shackley
in Vietnam. Shackley is
a friend of Michael
Ledeen, the "counter-
terrorism consultant"
who played such a vital
role in the Reagan ad-
ministration's sale of weapons to Iran.
Shackley also once worked as a consul-
tant for Hakim.
If such reticulated interrelationships
surprise you, you don't understand
Washington at all.
I had lunch with Shackley in the
restaurant of a new hotel in Virginia, a
subway ride under the Potomac River
from the federal district. The former
No. 2 espionage man in the CIA wore a
gray suit, looked slightly thin, and
seemed subdued. He said he was re-
covering from a prostate operation.
Over a Bloody Mary in a milkshake
glass with leafy stalks of celery poking
up, Shackley explained his role in the
Iran-Contra mess. He frowned when I
suggested he started the whole Iran-
Contra ball rolling. He said he met with
arms dealer Manucher Ghorbanifar in
Germany in the fall of 1984. The sub-
ject of hostages came up and Shackley
submitted a report to the state depart-
ment saying the Iranians might be
ready to trade hostages for money. He
said he "dusted off" a copy of his re-
port six months later for "a govern-
ment agency" and that was the last he
heard about it. (The Tower Commis-
sion report says Shackley gave it to
Ledeen, who gave it to North with the
comment that "Shackley had had a
contact ... who said he thought he
could ransom [William] Buckley," the
CIA Beirut station chief kidnapped and
killed by terrorists last year.)
Shackley said he had no more to
do with the deal. He also insisted he
had had nothing to do with arming the
Contras.
What about the stories linking him
and others-Cuban expatriate Rafael
Chi Chi Quintero, former CIA officer
Thomas Clines, Secord, Hakim and so
on-to extragovern mental covert activi-
ties? What about the- Christic lawsuit?
What about the "Shadow CIA?"
"It reminds me of that scene in Casa-
blanca," Shackley said. 'The one where
the police chief turns to his lieutenant
and says, 'Round up the
usual suspects.' "
Edwin P. Wilson, I
told Shackley, is saying
you had something to
do with a secret team
that hunted down and
killed terrorists. Shack-
ley looked puzzled. I ex-
plained that Wilson was
telling people that there
had been a team in the
1970s, operated by Wil-
son, Terpil and several
anti-Castro Cubans in
the Mideast. Shackley
was supposedly aware
of the team's activities.
"Impossible," said
Shackley. "That kind of
thing couldn't happen
in the government. It's just not possible."
MEANWHILE, THE DISCLOSURES
about Hakim multiplied.
With the release of a report
by the U.S. Senate Select
Committee on Intelligence, Hakim ap-
peared to have worked his way into the
core of U.S. foreign policy toward Iran,
Nicaragua and several other unnamed
countries where the U.S. was secretly
supporting "wars of liberation" against
Marxist governments.
Even the few people who had fol-
lowed Hakim for years had underesti-
mated his ability to insinuate himself
into the workings of U.S. intelligence.
Hakim apparently was the financial
man for the Reagan administration's
support of anti-communist guerrillas.
He was a key figure in its trans-
fer of arms to Iran. He played
an important role in the Contra
pipeline, buying a Dutch ship,
the Erria, which was used to
ferry Soviet AK-47 rifles to
Central America, other weap-
ons to Iran and several million
dollars in ransom money to Cy-
prus, where it was to be used
to buy the lives of American
hostages in Beirut. While he
was opening a "second chan-
nel" to Iran (the first channel
was Manucher Ghorbanifar),
Hakim was busily lining up fu-
ture business deals for himself.
b"
5.
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tiakim's business activities
played an important role in the
secret wars the Reagan admin-
istration has fought against
Third World communism. He
was their man in Switzerland,
transferring weapons here,
money there, deftly and dis-
creetly, like the good middle
man he had been his entire
business life.
But aside from reports from
business associates that he was
traveling in Europe and had
visited South Korea (his sec-
ond wife is Korean), there was
nothing to be heard from him.
Hakim, an elusive shadow, was
becoming emblematic of the
whole inexplicable scandal.
Then one day a businessman
I know heard from him, and all
seemed to be well. Hakim was
excited and trying to drum up
money. It seems that despite
the negative press he had been
receiving, he was onto great
opportunities for selling food
and medical supplies to Iran.
sill he needed was a backer.
BEYOND THE RANGE OF
business opportunities
it seems to have engen-
dered, it's hard to know
what the final word on Iran-
scam will be. For all its sources,
even the Washington press
corps is like those people in
Plato's cave, watching shadows
on the wall. Only a few know
what or who is casting the
shadows of the Iran-Contra af-
fair. And all I am certain of is
that the ones who know the
truth are anything but Plato's
philosopher-kings.
Amid all this furor, one fig-
ure was strangely absent: Presi-
dent Reagan. After his early ap-
pearances on television, the
scandal unfolded without him.
There grew in me a sense that
Washington was a deserted bat-
tlefield, that the foreign-policy
war between the liberals and
the conservatives was over.
Increasingly, the administra-
tion's ideologues had had to
conduct their operations in
secret. The Contra pipeline was
secret because the Contra war
was unpopular with a large
segment of the American pub-
lic and completely repulsive
to a smaller segment, which
bridled at backing former So-
moza cutthroats in the name of
freedom. The ill-fated Iran hos-
tage-missiles swap was secret
because Reagan had taught us
to hate Iran.
The element of hypocrisy in
all this reminded me of the
Marcos story. It was not the
mere disclosure of the Philippine
president's stash of hidden
wealth that enraged Filipinos.
It was that it stood in stark con-
trast to Marcos' own policy: The
Philippines was mired in grow-
ing poverty, and Marcos had
made a big issue of capital
flight, speaking out against it and
having people arrested for it.
Now, Reagan and the conser-
vatives, their secret dealings ex-
posed, had lost control of U.S.
foreign policy. The liberals,
aware of their complete victo-
ry, were trying to decide how
generous to be to the losers
and testing the situation for its
maximum political advantage.
There was another lesson for
the president: Reagan had
dropped his guard in Washing-
ton, a town swarming with
weird self-seekers, political
parasites, ideologues and hang-
ers-on, and had paid the price.
He set various covert opera-
tives in motion on behalf of
something called the Reagan
Doctrine and walked away; he
was amazed at the shambles
when he looked again. As far as
I can tell, Reagan just didn't
understand what town he was
living in.
WITH LITTLE ELSE TO
do, I placed another
call to Hakim's of-
fice in Washington.
His secretary answered.
"Mr. Hakim is traveling," she
said. "I'll tell him you called."
"Tell him I've called 20 or
30 times," I replied.
"I think he knows," she
said. p
PETE CAREY is a staff writer
for the Mercury News. He won
a Pulitzer Prize in 1986 for his
reporting on the Philippines.
Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2012/01/19: CIA-RDP90-00965R000201030001-8
 Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2012/01/19: CIA-RDP90-00965R000201030001-8 7
Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2012/01/19: CIA-RDP90-00965R000201030001-8