HONDURAS WARY OF U.S. POLICY

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP90-00965R000201180018-4
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 1
• Document Creation Date: December 22, 2016
• Document Release Date: January 20, 2012
• Sequence Number: 18
• Publication Date: February 24, 1985
• Content Type: OPEN SOURCE

STAT
Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2012/01/20 :
t RT t -E ~;p?EARED
a~- ~ ~~ - WNSHI I fIN POST
24 February 1985
AN UNEASY PARTNER'
First of Three Articles >. _
Elondtnus Wary of U.S. Policy
Support for Nicaraguan Rebels, El Salvador Raises Concern
By Joanne Omang and Edward Cody
V ashingtor. Post Staff Writers
The United States and Honduras -have reached a
crucial stage in their relations as the Reagan admin
istration strives to keep pressure on Nicaragua's
leftist government from Honduran bases and Hon-
duran leaders grow wary of getting in too deep.
The Hondurans' hesitation, chiefly among military
officers, has cast a shadow over U.S. policy in Cen-
tral America, which has placed Honduras at the cen-
ter of efforts against Nicaragua and leftist insurgents
in El Salvador.
For the most part, the Reagan administration ap-
pears to be listening to new Honduran demands with
halt an ear, concerned more with how Honduras fits
into U.S. goals in the region than with Honduras',
own objectives.
This article examines the role of Honduras in U.S.
policy. Subsequent articles Monday and Tuesday will
-
look at the country's importance 36 rebels. fighting
the Nicaraguan government and at the political pro-
cess-in Honduras.
When leftist Sandinistas took,power in neighbor-
ing Nicaragua in 1979, and leftist guerrillas gained
strength in El Salvador, official Washington scram-
bled to befriend neglected Honduras, rediscovering
old alliances and forging new ones. Honduras, wor
ried that it was the left's next target, was happy to
oblige.
Honduras now is the staging area for U.S. milita
exercises and clandestine operations against Nica-
ragua. It is a rest-and-recreation stop, a training
field. intelligence center and supply base.
About 1,300 U.S. military and 150 diplomatic per- _
sornel are stationed there, and the number grows to {
around 5,000 during the nearly nonstop military ma-
neuvers. The exercises have cost the United States
at least $100 million, and further millions have gone,
into housing, two radar stations, a field hospital and into
building or improving eight airfields-most of it alleg-
edly temporary construction for the exercises. There is
also a U.S.-built Regional Military Training Center,
which Washington hopes to make permanent.
An airfield at Aguacate in central Honduras, im-
proved for what the administration said then was sup-
port for the Big Pine 2 exercise in 1983, has become
the main base for'anti-Sandinista airdrops to guerrillas
in Nicaragua, according to a knowledgeable rebel offi-
cial.
Another airfield, at Palmerola, northwest.of Tegu-
cigalpa, expanded with U.S. military construction funds,
has become headquarters for a 1,200-man semiperma-
nent U.S. military presence, including a field hospital
and a U.S. air reconnaissance squadron that flies reg-
ular missions in support of Salvadoran Army troops.
Officially, relations between the United States and
Honduras could hardly be warmer.
But Honduras, as it has for decades, wants to be
more to the United States than a stationary aircraft
carrier. In the words of one knowledgeable State De-
partment analyst, Honduras is "squeaking in an effort to
get some grease," -asking for more economic and mil-
itary aid, staking out some independent policies and
demanding a_ written U.S. defense commitment.
The most dramatic demonstration of its new de-
mands came last September, when Hondurans barred
Salvadoran soldiers from the Regional Military Training
Center set up with U.S. funds at Puerto Castilla on the
Atlantic coast expressly to train Salvadorans without
increasing the-number of U.S. advisers in El Salvador.
About 5,000, Salvadorans went through courses under
U.S. trainers from June 1983 until Honduras, which has
a longstanding border dispute with El Salvador, insisted
that no more Salvadorans be trained there.
A ranking U.S. official in the Honduran capital of Te-
,gucigalpa said agreement looks likely before the end of
next month, when new U.S. money must be committed,
to resume training Salvadorans under a compromise
acceptable to the Honduran military command. Reso-
lution of other demands also is probable in the long run,
U.S. and Honduran sources said, because senior Hon-
-duran military officers share U.S. concern over the San-
dinista government in Nicaragua and have become de-
pendent on U.S. leadership and financial aid. '
:. ,- "If the United States stopped aid, I don't know how
long the ammunition would last," said a Honduran who
:strongly opposes his government's extensive cooper-
ation with U.S. policies. "It is a total dependency." -
Honduran and U.S. sources with access to the mil-
itary emphasized, for instance, that the government so
far has done nothing to stop or scale down Big Pine 3,
11 weeks of joint military maneuvers that began Feb.
11 and are scheduled to involve up to 4,500 U.S. sol-
diers with M60 tanks and M113 armored personnel
carriers.
But they added that the armed forces commander
Gen. Walter Lopez, appears resolved to halt or reduce
Honduran support of anti-Sandinista guerrilla forces
based here unless the U.S. Congress endorses admin-
istration policy by approving renewed CIA funding for
?' ,
QN[M114W
Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2012/01/20: CIA-RDP90-00965R000201180018-4