U.S. WON'T DISPUTE HAVANA ON TALLY

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP90-00965R000402700019-2
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 2
• Document Creation Date: December 22, 2016
• Document Release Date: January 26, 2012
• Sequence Number: 19
• Publication Date: October 31, 1983
• Content Type: OPEN SOURCE

STAT
r Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2012/01/26: CIA-RDP90-00965R000402700019-2
NEW YORK MES
31 October 1983
M. WON'T DISPUTE
HAVANA ON TALLY
Estimate of Nationals on Isle
Is Reduced by Washington
By RICHARD HALLORAN
Special W TAe New Poet T ose
WASHINGTON, Oct. 30 - A senior
State Department official said today
that the United States did not dispute
Cuba's statement that there were only
784 Cubans on Grenada when American
forces invaded the island on Tuesday.
The Reagan Administration said Fri-
day that its latest figures showed that
there were more than 1,100 Cubans
there.
The senior State Department official
said "no one is quarreling with" the
Cuban figure. He spoke after a repre-
sentative of the Cuban Government re-
iterated a statement that there were
7b4 Cubans on the Caribbean island at
the time of the invasion.
At the Pentagon, a Defense Depart-
ment spokesman said that the official
United States count of Cubans on Gre-
nada had been revised to less than the
earlier estimate of 1,100, but said he
could not give a new number.
Different Esti
mates
The Administration's Friday esti-
mate of 1,100 Cubans was 10 percent
higher than the estimate offered the
day before and almost twice as large as
the estimate made before the invasion
began Tuesday. The Friday announce.
ment came amid a growing debate
about why intelligence agencies had
failed to measure Cuban strength on
the Caribbean island more accurately.
Military officials have said the
United States has captured 638 Cubans.
Other officers said privately that be-
tween 154 and 200 Cubans were still at
large on Grenada, some of them contin-
uing sniper fire at American troops.
Another State Department official,
Deputy Secretary of State Kenneth
Dam, said the earlier judgment that
placed 1,100 armed Cubans on Grenada
"was based upon some documents but
now that we've gotten better informa-
tion, we've gotten a new estimate."
Agreement With Cuban Figure
He did not say what the new estimate
was, but the other senior official indi-
cated the department agreed with the
Cuban figure.
Mr. Dam, who spoke on the CBS
News program' Face the Nation," also.,
said the United States had captured
Soviet, Cuban, and North Korean.docu-
meats on Grenada that he said were
agreements to supply Grenada with
militarygoods.
He said American forces in Grenada
had found "a treasure trove of docu-
ments," including three supply agree-
ments with the Soviet Union and one
each with Cuba and North Korea.
In another?development,.a Pentagon
apoiaesman said be had no information
on aveport by Michael Posner, a corre-
spondent for the Canadian news ?mga-
zine Maclean', that bombing by the,
United States had killed 47 inmates in a
mental hospital near Richmond Hill,
the site of a prison.near the Grenadian
capital. Mr. Posner said a nurse had
taken him through the rubble of the
hospital, where some Cuban soldiers
had taken refuge before the bombing.
He said the nurse had told him that
there was no way that any attacker
could have identified the institution as
a hospital. The Defense Department
spokesman said, "We have no informa-
tion to confirm or deny that report. "
Civilian Casualties
The spokesman also said that the de-
partment had no official figure on the
number of civilian casualties that
i might have resulted from the fighting
in Grenada but that repvrts showed
there were "almost none. "
Senior military officers said that
Army Rangers, trained in operations to
rescue civilian hostages after Ameri-
cans were held for 444 days in Iran, had
been largely responsible for holding
civilian casualties in ground action to a
minimum.
The Defense Department reported
tonight that the latest casualty figures
from United States forces in Grenada
showed 16 killed in action, 77 wounded
and three missing. Four of those listed
as killed on today's casualty list had
previously been listed as missing.
Military officers said that United
States aircraft were flying reconnais-
sance missions over small islands be-
longing to Grenada just north of the
main island to see whether armed
Cubans were there. The largest of these
is Carriacou, about 20 miles north of
the main island.
The officers said United States forces
could not be, withdrawn from Grenada
as long as there was a threat of contin-
ued Cuban fighting.
Cubans `Not Soldiers'
On the matter of the Cubans in Gre-
nada, Ramon Sdnchez?-Parodi, an offi-
cial in the Cuban Interests Section that
acts here in the interests of Cuban citi-
zens, said on the -CBS News program
that the 784 Cubans "were not sol-
diers." Ht added, "They were people
who were construction workers."
On Friday, the Cuban Government
issued a detailed list of its nationals on
Grenada, saying that of the 784, 636
were construction workers, with others
working in public health, education,
fishing, transport, trade, culture and
communications. It said 43 were mem-
bers of.thearmed forces, of whom 22
were army officers and the rest trans.
inaaequate -intelligence reportins
Grenada from the be i . Th said
the intelligence services
otograp o atri cZd~ onstruct3 Orr
an u cams but Ia~teedagents on
the ground who could provide eyewit-
tress repo on Tlnd anna-
m
tes Govern-
ment estimate, made before the inva-
sion, held that 600 Cubans were on the
island. A Defense Department official
said captured' documents were the
source of the estimate of 1,100 Cubans,
many of them armed. The Pentagon
ha? repudiated that figure, but no offi-
cial number has been issued to replace
it.
Referring to the "trove of docu-
ments" found on Grenada, Mr. Dam
said "the Soviet agreement provided
for transshipment of goods through
Cuba" but gave no further details. He
said the Government was analyzing the
documents "because we don't want to
misrepresent what they show," and he
hoped they would be available to the
public later.
Other senior Administration officials
said the documents would show that the
[Soviet Union and Cuba intended to turn
Grenada into a supply depot for leftist
umsurgencies throughout Latin Amer-
ica. They said most of the weapons al-
found in Grenada were light arms, in-
cluding the Soviet-made AK-47 auto-
matic rifle, that would have been in-
tended for guerrilla warfare. The AK-
47, it was noted, was extensively used
by the Vietcong guerrillas in the Viet-
Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2012/01/26: CIA-RDP90-00965R000402700019-2
 Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2012/01/26: CIA-RDP90-00965R000402700019-2 ,Z,,
nam War. Reporters who saw the arms
stores on Grenada said they included
some antiquated arms also.
In addition to Mr. Dam, Lawrence S.
Eagleburger, Under Secretary of
State, and Jeane J. Kirkpatrick, the
chief United States representative at
the United Nations, appeared on televi-
sion programs today to explain Presi-
dent Reagan's decision to land United
States troops to the Caribbean island
Tuesday morning.
Mrs. Kirkpatrick, who appeared on
the NBC News program "Meet the
Press," said that the United States had
suffered no moral loss with the inva-
sion of Grenada.
"I'm telling you," she said, "that I
don't think there's any moral cost to
that action."
Defense Department officials were
asked if the United States plans to re-
move marines from-Grenada and dis-
patch them to Lebanon to replace the
marine unit there. The officials said
the marines in the Caribbean were
standing by to be withdrawn, but that
move had not yet begun. The depart-
ment had said earlier that the marines
would begin to move "within a few
days ,1
With Army Rangers having been
withdrawn, a Pentagon spokesman
said today, the total number of Ameri-
can troops on the island had dropped to
about 5,000.
Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2012/01/26: CIA-RDP90-00965R000402700019-2