'INVASION'

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP90-00965R000402760010-5
• Release Decision: RIFPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 1
• Document Creation Date: December 22, 2016
• Document Release Date: January 26, 2012
• Sequence Number: 10
• Publication Date: April 1, 1986
• Content Type: OPEN SOURCE

Declassified and Approved For Release 2012/01/26: CIA-RDP90-00965R000402760010-5
ARTIC- - C~_
ONPACE. -_ CHRISTIAN SCIENCE MONITOR
1 April 1986
JOSEPH C. NARSCH
111I1VaSlOi1,
THE existence of "contra" bases and forces in-
side Honduras first broke into the public print
officially in March of 1982, when the Nicara-
guan government petitioned the Security Council of
the United Nations to investigate "acts of provoca-
tion" allegedly committed along its northern frontier
from Honduras.
On Nov. 12, 1982, the Honduran government de-
nied the existence of camps of "exiles" inside Hondu-
ras, but it promised to take "appropriate measures" to
prevent any hostile acts being committed against
Nicaragua from Honduran territory.
On Jan. 4, 1983, Nicaragua wrote United States
Secretary of State George Shultz protesting attacks
from contra camps in Honduras into Nicaraguan terri-
tory and exhibited weapons allegedly captured from
the contras.
These were early external signs of something going
on along the Honduran-Nicaraguan border. The story
first came out in early 1984, when between Feb. 25
and March 28 six neutral ships were damaged by
mines in the approaches to Nicaraguan harbors. The
mines had been planted by agents of the US Central
Intelligence Agency, the CIA. Congress disapproved
strongly and passe a law forbidding the use of
American funds to support the counterrevolutionary
forces operating against Nicaragua. (It condemned
the mining, by votes of 84 to 12 in the Senate and 281
to 111 in the House.)
Since then the full story has been learned, mostly
from former officials of the US government and from
former members of the contra forces. The contra
movement was organized, its people recruited, its
camps built, and forces deployed by the CIA, begin-
ning in 1981. The original contras were mostly offi-
cers of the National Guard from the Samoza regime.
They numbered about 2,000 men in late 1981 and
early 1982, when they began raids into Nicaragua.
They recruited as they raided. Their numbers have
since expanded to somewhere between 15,000 and
20,000. (This does not include native Indians and an-
other force of contras in Costa Rica which are not sup-
ported by the CIA.)
The raids gained in frequency and depth during
1984, but the raiders suffered a severe setback in
early 1986, when the Nicaraguan government started
using six helicopter gunships from the Soviets against
the raiders. In the broadest sense the contras were on
the offensive inside Nicaragua during 1983 and 1984,
but were pushed to the defensive in '85.
There was excitement in Washington last week
when it was reported that a Nicaraguan force had "in-
vaded" Honduras.
Previous to the "invasion" of Honduras from Nica-
ragua, the contras from the camps in Honduras had
been operating inside Nicaragua for more than three
years, and in larger numbers than what Washington
estimates to be the size of last week's reverse invading
force.
Under international law it is the duty of a sover-
eign state to police its own territory and prevent hos-
tile acts against others from being launched from in-
side its own borders. Honduras promised but failed to
prevent the contra raids into Nicaragua.
In March 1916 Pancho Villa, a Mexican irregular
leader, sortied in the United States, raided Columbus,
N.M., set fire to the town, and killed 16 of its citizens.
President Wilson responded by sending a US army of
6,000 men into Mexico, under Gen. John J. Pershing,
in pursuit of Pancho Villa. They went 300 miles into
Mexico, but never caught up with Villa. The American
action was in "hot pursuit" of a brigand force which
the government of Mexico could not control. The ac-
tion deemed proper under international law.
If the American expedition into Mexico in 1916 was
a legitimate response to a single incursion into its ter-
ritory by a raiding force that Mexico could not con-
trol, then Nicaragua was entitled to respond in like
manner to multiple incursions into its own territory
from Honduras which Honduras was unable or un-
willing to prevent.
Declassified and Approved For Release 2012/01/26: CIA-RDP90-00965R000402760010-5