CIA HAD SECRET AGENT ON POLISH GENERAL STAFF

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP90-00965R000807560040-5
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: C
• Document Page Count: 38
• Document Creation Date: December 22, 2016
• Document Release Date: February 8, 2012
• Sequence Number: 40
• Publication Date: June 20, 1986
• Content Type: LETTER

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.LTr1 ` C 7 EARED
CIA Had Secret Agent on Polish General Staff
Warsaw Aide Says U.S. Received Plans for Martial Law but Kept Them Quiet
By Bob Woodward
and Michael Dobbs
Washington Poet Soil( Wntcr.
At a secret, high-level meeting in
Warsaw during early November
1981, a very agitated Soviet official
announced to members of the Pol-
ish government and general staff
that plans for the upcoming crack-
down on the Solidarity trade union
were somehow inexplicably leaking
to the United States, according to
informed sources familiar with U.S.
intelligence reports. Everyone at
this session voiced dismay, even
outrage at the betrayal of such
state secrets.
Polish Col. Wladyslaw Kuklinski,
a senior staff officer involved in
planning the martial law crackdown,
joined in, expressing particular
shock and distress, the sources
said. He then left the meeting and
gave a prearranged emergency sig-
nal to the Central Intelligence
Agency station in Warsaw. Within
hours the colonel, his wife and at
least one son were "exfiltrated," the
CIA tradecraft name for the under-
cover extraction of agents in dan-
ger.
Kuklinski had been a longtime
human asset of the CIA who pro-
vided such superior intelligence
about the planned crackdown and
forthcoming imposition of martial
law that the White House had "the
operational blueprint," one U.S.
source said. At one point, the
source said, these plans were on
President Reagan's desk.
In an interview in Warsaw yes-
terday with a Washington Post cor-
respondent, Polish government
spokesman Jerzy Urban volun-
teered information about the case,
including naming Kuklinski and
stating that he had been deeply in-
volved in planning for martial law.
Urban said Kuklimki had been a
CIA spy on the Polish general staff
and claimed that the Reagan admin-
istration could have prevented the
imposition of martial law the next
month, December 1981, by making
public the then top-secret Polish
intentions.
"The U.S. administration could
have publicly revealed these plans
to the world and warned Solidarity,"
Urban said. "Had it done so, the
implementation of martial law
would have been impossible."
The Polish decision to disclose
hitherto secret details about Kuk-
linski, including revealing his name
publicly for the first time, appeared
designed to bolster the Warsaw
government's contention that Rea-
gan failed to do all he could to help
Solidarity and was not interested in
a peaceful solution to the Polish
crisis.
U.S. sources denied that this
would have been possible because,
according to their account, the only
key fact Kuklinski had been unable
to provide was the date the Polish
government planned to impose mar-
tial law.
The CIA considered the penetra-
tion of the Polish high command to
be among their most important in-
telligence successes. Over a period
of time, Kuklinski had provided
stunning, timely information on var-
ious plans from the highest levels of
the Polish government and general
staff, U.S. sources said, but in the
past some of those plans had never
been executed.
"We had everything in the plan
but the day," one U.S. source said,
"and therefore there was no way to
act."
But Urban, in the interview, said
that Kuklinski was aware that Dec.
15 was a deadline for the imple-
mentation of martial law since large
numbers of conscripts were due to
be discharged from the Army at
that time.
The declaration of martial law on
Dec. 13, 1981, by Poland's military
leader, Gen. Wojciech Jaruzelski,
effectively ended the first experi-
ment in trade union pluralism in a
communist country.
Kuklinski and his family now live
in the United States under new
identities, according to two U.S.
government sources. One of them
described Kuklinski as "a very
brave man who became an agent
(for the CIA) not for money but be-
cause he detested what the Soviets
and [Polish) military government
had done to his country."
The source said that Kuklinski
was convicted in Poland of espio-
nage and the death sentence was
imposed in absentia.
Kuklinski was able to provide the
CIA with a copy of the final oper-
ational plan for the crackdown on
Solidarity, according to U.S.
sources. Copies of this plan. which
did not have a date for implementa-
tion, were printed in the Soviet
U"h so that as few Poles as pos-
side 'would know about it, the
saiitces said.
'Oa -Dec. 23, 1981, in a televised
speech on the crackdown in Poland
tlpt'. had taken place 10 days ear-
lier, Reagan said: "It is no coinci-
dence that the martial law procla-
mations ... were being printed in
the Soviet Union in September." At
the time, some former intelligence
officials and other experts sug-
gested that Reagan's remarks were
an unusual breach of official secre-
cy.
Urban yesterday said that Kuk-
linsid knew such details as lists of
internees, movements of Polish
Army units, and the preparation of
anti-Solidarity legislation to accom-
pany the state of emergency.
As the one condition for speaking
on the record, Urban insisted that
Th!- Washington Post should ask
the U.S. administration about his
account of one of the most myste-
rious episodes in the entire Solidar-
ity drama.
The White House had no imme-
diate comment last night.
The meticulously planned crack-
down, which was accompanied by
the internment of an estimated
5,000 union activists, followed 16
months of gathering tension be-
tween Solidarity and the Commu-
nist authorities.
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U#han said the Polish authorities
first' became aware that Kuklinski
was a U.S. agent when he failed to
report for work on Nov. 6, 1981.
His house, and the houses of his two
sons, were found to be empty.
According to Urban, the Polish
authorities assumed that the CIA
had decided to "withdraw" Kuklinski
along with his entire family from
Poland in order to be able to reveal
his information on the preparations
for martial law without jeopardizing
his safety. Urban said it was be-
lieved in Warsaw that Kuklinski was
safely in U.S. hands from Nov. 7.
The Polish authorities waited for
some kind of announcement from
Washington. But time passed and
the United States was silent, so the
plans were put into effect," Urban
said. He described Kuklinski as "an
operational officer in charge of plan-
ning martial law" on the Army gen-
eral staff, but would not give his
exact position.
Urban's version of the Kuklinski
case differed sharply with a frag-
mented account that appeared in
Newsweek magazine in December
1982, reportedly drawn from U.S.
sources. According to the News-
week account, which did not name
the agent, the Reagan administra-
tion was unable to warn Solidarity
about the imminence of martial law
without putting the colonel's life in
jeopardy. This claim was dismissed
by Urban today as "nonsense."
His own analysis of the reasons
for Washington's silence, Urban
said, was.that the Reagan admin-
istration appeared to believe that
.the imposition of martial law would
result in a "bloody conflict" in Po-
land that the United States had no
interest in preventing. He said that
Reagan later became very angry at
the ease with which Solidarity was
crushed.
"This incident gave us an insight
into Reagan's actions and sayings.
Much of the love which he pro-
fesses for Solidarity is insincere. He
could have prevented the arrests
and internments, but did not," Ur-
ban said.
The disclosure by the Polish gov-
ernment of an incident that would
normally be hushed up by a commu-
nist country appeared to result in
part from continuing political
strains between Warsaw and Wash-
ington. Urban accused the Reagan
administration of continuing to take
a hostile attitude toward Poland by
receiving exiled Solidarity leaders
and expressing support for the Sol-
idarity underground.
Asked why the information had
not been disclosed beforehand, he
replied: "It is not an easy or pleas-
ant matter to reveal that the Amer-
icans had an agent so high in our
headquarters or that a Polish col-
onel was an American spy. We were
patient and had hopes that things
could be worked our between
Washington and Warsaw.
Urban said Kuklinski was present
at a high-level planning meeting for
martial law a couple of days before
his disappearance and was there-
fore particularly well-informed. The
meeting was also attended by heads
of all Army and government depart-
ments involved in the preparation of
the highly secret operation, the ex-
istence of which was known only to
a handful of people close to Jaruzel-
ski.
The maintenance of strict secre-
cy was a key element in the success
of the Polish government's plans to
suspend, and eventually outlaw, a
JERZY URBAN
... calls colose who fled, a CIA spy
massive social movement that num-
bered an estimated 10 million mem-
bers by late 1981 without large-
scale loss of life. Solidarity activists
were caught completely by surprise
when special police units began the
mass arrests in the early hours of
Dec. 13.
Besides raising questions about
the Reagan administration's han-
dling of the crisis, Urban's account
also provided official confirmation
that plans to implement martial law
were well advanced by November
1981. Previously, Polish spokesman,
had insisted that the crackdown was
a last-minute decision motivated by
a call by Solidarity for street pro-
tests on Dec. 17.
Bob Woodward reported from
Washington and Michael Dobbs
from Warsaw for this article. Staff
Researcher Barbara Feinman in
Washington also contributed to it.
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AL-. .~1 WASHINGTON POST
24 January 1986
U.S. Navy Planes to Begin
Operations North of Libya
Cant to request U.S. assistance in
By Bob Woodward
and George C. Wilson
Waehmiton Pmt Stitt Writers
The Reagan administration yes-
terday ordered two aircraft carrier
battle groups in the Mediterranean
to begin flight operations north of
Libya, Defense Department officials
said.
The warplane operations, sched-
uled to begin from the carriers USS
Saratoga and USS Coral Sea last
night, were described by one ad-
ministration official yesterday as
"part of the war of nerves" between
the Reagan administration and the
Libyan leader, Col. Muammar Qad-
dafi. The Navy planes will be within
range of Libyan radar as they fly
training exercises but are under
orders not to cross into Libyan air-
space, the official said.
The carrier operations are the
latest in a series of maneuvers by
the administration in an attempt to
show resolve against Qaddafi, who
has been repeatedly accused of sup-
porting international terrorism.
Earlier this month, Reagan an-
nounced further economic sanctions
against Libya.
At the same time, in White_
House meetin s Jan. 6 and 7 Rea-
an a so or ere tat more money
and manpower be devoted to te
development of a CIA covert oper-
ation against a a i and that an
envoy be sent to Egypt for turtheF
discussions about coordinating pos-
sible military options, sources said.
Although there have been discus-
sions within the administration re-
cently about ambitious anti-Libyan
military options, the sources said
that at this point joint action by the
United States and its Middle East
allies would be undertaken only if
Qaddafi attacks a neighboring na-
tion or is found to be responsible for
terrorist actions similar to the Dec.
27 attacks on the Rome and Vienna
airports.
Some administration officials
want to encourage Egypt to be
more aggressive in confronting Lib-
ya, the sources said. These officials
believe Egypt has been too reluc-
any potential anti-Qaddafi moves,
said the sources, who spoke on con-
dition that they not be identified.
Anti-Qaddafi feeling runs high in
the Egyptian Defense Ministry,
where the special envoy was ex-
pected to hold his discussions. But
A U.S. official
called the oper-
ations "part of the
war of nerves."
other officials in Cairo are reluctant
to demonstrate any military alliance
with the United States against an-
other Arab nation because of the
potential political repercussions in
Egypt, the sources added.
A Pentagon team began initial
military planning discussions in
Egypt late last summer because of
administration concerns about pos-
sible military and terrorist moves
by Qaddafi in the region. The plan-
ning began following the hijacking
of Trans World Airlines Flight 847
in June in which one American was
killed and 39 others held hostage
for 17 days.
Sources said that under a plan
approved the president last year,
the is working hard to develop
a blueprint or undermining
dab, but has been hampered by the
absence of a large, well-or anized
and committed group of opposition
forces either inside or outside the
country.
One source spoke of the need for
some "Qaddafi contras," a reference
to the large, U.S.-backed rebel
group trying to overthrow the San-
dinista regime in Nicaragua. 'thin
administration intelligence circ es
there is growing skepticism that the
CIA's anti-addafi plan will work
because of the absence of opposi-
tion forces, due in part to a is
ruthless campaign o i op
anywhere in the world. I e-rF s
been one estimate it will tak
up to a year to get any CIN-oFF
off the ground.
At the same time, the CIA wants
to identify and cultivate oteniial
successors to a a i w o are pro-
. vroblem is worsened
by the strong anti-American sen-
timents prevailing throughout much
of Libyan society, according to in-
telligence estimates.
"There are people in Libya, es-
pecially in the military, who don't
like Qaddafi," one source said, "but
most hate the United States."
Although Qaddafi claims the en-
tire Gulf of Sidra and its airspace as
Libyan territory, the United States
recognizes territorial waters ex-
tending only 12 miles from the Lib-
yan coast. Initially, U.S. planes are
expected to begin flying north of
the gulf but eventually work their
way south within a week, the official
indicated. The warships are author-
ized to sail in the Gulf of Sidra to
reassert U.S. rights in the region.
The first indication of the exer-
cises came yesterday when the
Pentagon confirmed that the Navy
had issued a "Notice of Intent to
Conduct Flight Operations" through
the International Civil Aeronautical
Organization.
That document, which is not clas-
sified, says carrier flight operations
will be conducted for a week within
the Tripoli Flight Information Re-
gion, a sector of airspace extending
scores of miles from Libya. The
notice said all operations would be
conducted in international airspace
with aircraft operating either under
visual flight rules "or within radar
surveillance and radio communica-
tions of a surface or airborne radar
facility."
According to one report, the last
time Navy jets conducted opera-
tions within the Tripoli flight region
was on Jan. 27 and 28, 1985. Qad-
dafi claimed at the time that the
United States was planning to in-
vade his country and cited a similar
Notice of Intent.
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White House officials denied re-
ports that the current exercise was
intended to provoke Qaddafi. In the
past month, following the European
airport attacks and accusations of
Libyan complicity, activity in the
Mediterranean has become more
intense as Libyan forces were put
on alert, the Soviet Union increased
its surveillance of the U.S. Sixth
Fleet and the United States in-
creased its presence to more than
two dozen Navy ships.
Two Libyan Mig 25 fighters flew
next to a Navy EA6B electronic
jamming plane outside the Gulf of
Sidra last week but took no action.
The incident was played down as
routine by Defense Secretary Cas-
par W. Weinberger.
On Aug. 19, 1981, Navy fighters
shot down two Libyan fighters
above the Gulf of Sidra after the
Libyans allegedly fired first.
Staff researcher Barbara Feinman
contributed to this report.
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ARTICI,Z _IPPUM
ON PAGE
WASHINGTON POST
8 July 1985
CIA Covertly Aiding
Pro-West Cambodians
By Charles R. Babcock
and Bob Woodward
wad Pat StW(wfite,.
Thai$ themselves have set up strin-
g s.
us modest covert-aid program
is '60e sign of the Reagan adminis-
ti ion's increasing willingness to
offerhupport to groups fighting left-
%%g. and communist governments
in., the Third World. Although the
adininistratioon is still proceeding
cautm-usly, many of its officials have
begun to speak out about the need
to help such insurgencies.
,CIA Director William J. Casey,
Cambodia. Rep. Stephen J. Solari
(D-N.Y.) is pushing for $5 million in
such aid, although the House has
yet to act.
Reagan administration officials at
first opposed overt military aid, but
recently shifted and are supporting
a version of the Solari provision, al-
ready passed by the Senate, that
lets the administration decide
whether to supply economic or mil-
itary aid. At.this point, administra-
tion officials say, they see no reason
to provide military aid.
After Vietnam invaded Cambodia
in late 1978, sources said, the Car-
ter administration began a small
program to support Thailand's ef-
forts to counter Vietnamese and So-
viet influence. The funds were used
for noncommunist insurgent lead-
ers' travel expenses and for upkeep
of resistance camps near the Thai-
Cambodian border.
The Reagan program began as
the United States and ASEAN were
pressuring the noncommunist
groups to make a coalition with the
Khmer Rouge.
China-which openly backs the
Khmer Rouge-and ASEAN both
supply the insurgent groups with
guns and ammunition. U.S. funds go
only for "nonlethal" aid, sources
said.
Some sources say this claim is
misleading because the U.S. aid
frees up other money that can be
used to buy military equipment.
They also say that the Khmer
Rouge benefit indirectly because
the U.S. money for the other two
resistance groups makes the whole
coalition stronger.
Despite the "nonlethal" label on
the secret U.S. aid one
mow able source said that a logistics
expert had traye.led to Thailand to
discuss the am . unirtion needs of the
noncommunists,
and o ers
Work the Thai c tary
men who advise the insurgents.
The a* current overt U.Said is
about $15 million a year in human-
itarian aid to Cambodian refugees
living at the Thai border.
to to sit as
Cambodian border Tuesday. a
shm
0 owm support for non-
co nist rebels i to the
com-
munist regime installed in Cambo-
dia by Vietnam. But accwding to'
tormesources, Shakes u c es-
ure is ac uauy a comaement to a
program of covert CIA aid to the
same insurgents.
cco to these sources the
Centr~Intelligence enc
been covert prm2gn% nn tars
dollars a year since or non-
military purposes to twv rioriootti-
munist Cambodian
resistance
--Thus aid is funneled
Thailand, the sources
Reagan administration's is to
strengthen the two noncommunist
resistance groups' position in t it
loose coalition wit t e communist
Khmer Rouge.
The Khmer Rouge, under Pol
Pot, were responsible for killing as
many as 3 million Cambodians while
they ruled the country from 1975
to 1979. Vietnam invaded Cambo-
dia, removed Pol Pot and installed a
puppet regime in Phnom Penh in
1979.
There is a congressional ban on
aiding the Khmer Rouge, but liberal
Democrats in the House have en-
couraged an effort to give aid open-
ly to the noncommunist insurgents,
proposing a grant of $5 million in
military assistance this year. Sev-
eralintellipence sauces, insist that
CIA officers in Thailand work close-
ly with the Thai military to ensure
than none of the covert aid is to
the Khmer Rouge, and that the
Who made an unpublicised visit to
the Thai-Cambodian border two
months ago, told U.S. News &
or pod in a recent interview,
"Every U.S. president since Fran c_-
lm Roosevelt has authorized sup-
port rebels opposing an oppres-
sive or i egitimate regime." He not-
ed that Cambodia was being occu-
pied by 170,000 Vietnamese
troops.
In March, the Cambodian insur-
gents suffered a major defeat when
Vietnamese forces overran their
camps in Cambodia and forced them
into Thailand. Thai and insurgent
forces fought battles more than a
mile inside Thailand when the Viet-
namese spilled over the border.
Shultz is scheduled to visit a non-
communist resistance camp just in-
side Thailand "as a statement of
support," a State Department offi-
cial said. Shultz is on his way to the
annual meeting of foreign ministers
of the Association of Southeast As-
ian Nations (ASEAN), who have
been asking the United States to
gdt? more directly involved in aiding
the insurgents.
The United States has already
become more involved in Thailand,
where American military aid has
tripled since the Vietnamese inva-
siop.of Cambodia, to nearly $100
a year.
This year, Congress has moved
td provide overt military support to
the ' noncommunist opposition in
Continued
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Many officials acknowledge that
the effort to strengthen the non-
communist resistance is a long shot.
One informed source said that "of
course, if the coalition wins, the
Khmer Rouge will 'eat the others
alive."
The Khmer Rouge are the
strongest of the three factions
fighting the Heng Samrin regime
the Vietnamese installed in Phnom
Penh. Pol Pot has about 35,000
fighters, according to State Depart-
ment estimates. The noncommunist
group headed by former prime min-
ister Son Sann has about 15,000
troops, and the one led by former
head of state Prince Norodom Si-
hanouk has perhaps 9,000.
Support in Congress for anticom-
munist insurgent groups every-
where has been growing, as recent
votes indicate. The House approved
sending "humanitarian" aid to the
contras, or counterrevolutionaries,
in Nicaragua. The Senate repealed
a ban on aid to re e s in-An ola.
And Congress consistent as
voted more covert aid to hg a`n in-
surgents-now about 0 million
a year-than the administration has
r uest.
A -number of experienced U.S. in-
telli eoce o icia s who have wor
in Southeast Asia are wary of new
CIA involvements there. They say
that maintaining meaningful control
of bot mone an and covert op-
erations is icu t not im ssi e
in a re ion w ere oca intrigues
magn" y the dangers and uncertain-
ties of all clandestine activities.
The most recent Reagan admin-
istration statement on overt aid
came in a letter to the House For-
eign Affairs Committee. It said the
administration "welcomes the
Solarz provision as an important
signal to Hanoi regarding congres-
sional and public attitudes toward
Vietnam's illegal occupation of
Cambodia and the threat it poses to
its other neighbors."
Staff researcher Barbara Feinman
contributed to this report.
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WASHINGTON POST
13 January 1985
U.S. Covert Aid to Afghans on the Rise
Rep. Wilson Spurs Drive for New Ands, Antiaircraft Cannon for the Insurgents
B Bob Woodward and Char bcock
m t.xt tall Writers
The Central Intelligence Agency's secret
aid to the insurgents fighting the Soviet
invaders in Afghanistan has mushroomed
into the largest U.S. covert operation since
the Vietnam war era, according to informed
sources.
With Rep. Charles Wilson (D-Tex.) as a
chief catalyst for the rapid escalation, Con-
gress has nearly tripled the Reagan admin-
istration's initial request for the Afghan
program to what will amount to about $250
million for this fiscal year. This would
amount to more than 80 percent of the
CIA's annual expenditures for covert oper-
ations, the sources said. In addition, three
other countries in the Middle East and Asia
are expected to provide $200 million. With
this money, the annual aid package to the
Afghan insurgents is approaching $500 mil-
lion. The sources also said that there is dis-
cussion that the insurgents could use $600
million in the next fiscal year.
The Afghan operation and the manner in
which it has expanded are becoming sub-
jects of heated controversy in the admin-
istration, the CIA and Congress.
A number of these officials, who do not
want to be identified, said that the program
has grown too much and too fast. These
sources said it is in danger of getting out of
hand and may trigger an escalation of So-
viet military operations in Afghanistan.
Others, including Wilson and congres-
sional supporters, said that the U.S. gov-
ernment is not doing enough, that equip-
ment being used is second-rate and that the
insurgents are not getting enough supplies
and ammunition. Some have advocated sup-
plying new, sophisticated U.S.-made
ground-to-air missiles, but the CIA vetoed
this, according to the sources.
Of particular controversy has been Wil-
son's successful effort to obtain money for
the CIA to supply advanced, heavy antiair-
craft cannon to the insurgents, a decision a
number of officials view as a potential es-
calation.
By year's end, the U.S. program, which
supplies weapons, ammunition, clothing,
medical supplies and money for food, is ex-
pected to support an estimated 200,000 to
300,000 full- or part-time insurgents who
are battling a Soviet army of 110,000
troops in what intelligence reports and var-
ious eyewitness accounts describe as one of
the most brutal, savage conflicts of modern
times.
"This is a program that is on the verge of
blowing up." one intelligence official said. "It
is an area of the world where there are
great, tensions .... The blinking
red lights are going off in that re-
gion now, [and] the focus is shifting
from Central America."
One congressional critic of the
escalation said, "We should have
learned from Vietnam about over-
technologizing primitive people."
Another intelligence official said,
"We're going to kill the program
with success."
Though there are hundreds of
cases documenting human rights
violations by the invading Soviet
army, the U.S. government now has
confirmed reports that the CIA-sup-
ported insurgents drugged, tor-
tured and forced from 50 to 200
Soviet prisoners to live like animals
in cages.
In addition, congressional
sources said that the insurgents
may be assassinating Soviet mili-
tary officers, and administrators.
U.S. intelligence officials said they
cannot and do not control the op-
erations of the resistance fighters
and have no knowledge of any as-
sassinations.
The large increases began in the
fall of 1983 with a secret Wilson
amendment to the defense appro-
priations bill rechanneling $40 mil-
lion of Defense Department money
to the CIA for the Afghan opera-
tion, the sources said.
Money Destined for Cannon
Part of this money was for the
riew, foreign-made, heavy antiair-
diaft cannon. Another $50 million
fOr more supplies and weapons was
reprogrammed at Wilson's initiative
ip the same way last July. The Sen-
ate, at the urging of Malcolm Wal-
lop (R-Wyo.), chairman of the Sen-
ate intelligence committee's budget
subcommittee, then took the lead in
increasing the annual aid to the
point where it is about $250 million
for fiscal year 1985.
The specific amount for 1985 is
difficult to calculate, according to
sources, because there is some un-
spent money from previous years
that is expected to be used this
year. But the sources said spending
will range frpm $250 million to
$280 million.
It is clear from interviews with
more than 20 officials familiar with
the Afghan covert aid program that
over the last 18 months, while pub-
lic attention has been focused on
the CIA's activities in Nicaragua,
Congress opened the dollar flow to
this much-less-visible program.
By contrast, Congress last year
cut off funding for opponents of the
government in Nicaragua that was
one-tenth the size, costing $24 mil-
lion a year and supporting 15,000
"contras" fighting the Sandinista
regime.
: Some in the Reagan administra-
t)on and the CIA at firsv opposed
tie large' increases in the Afghan
operation and were not sure that
the supply line, which runs secretly
through neighboring Pakistan,
could absorb the increased flow.
But officials said that after facing
years of public congressional hos-
tility to the secret war in Nicara-
gua, the CIA finally went along and
welcomed support in covert oper-
ations aimed at thwarting the So-
viets. in Afghanistan.
"It was a windfall to them," said
one congressional intelligence of-
ficial. "They'd faced so much oppo-
a;~ ,Pr f
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G
sticn 'o covert action in Central
_;mer ica and here comes the Con-
;ress helping and throwing money
,it them, putting money their way
:,nd they decided to say, 'Who are
we to say no?'
Increasing the Afghan program
also gave Congress a chance to
show it is not soft on communism
and Soviet expansionism, congres- i
sional sources said. "Over the last
two years," one senior administra-
tion official said, as the Nicaraguan
operation became the bad war, the
one in Afghanistan became the good
War." '
The decision to supply the new
antiaircraft cannon, for use against
Soviet helicopter gunships that are
deployed against civilians and insur-
gents, has been especially contro-
versial. One intelligence official
said, "When this [weapon] gets in
and if helicopters start getting shot
out of the sky with regularity,
we've got a problem .... A weap-
on like this could force the Soviets
to become more indiscriminate, in
their use of force. They could begin
much more bombing. [It could]
change the equation radically."
Some intelligence officials cite
Wilson's involvement with the new
antiaircraft cannon as an example of
what the CIA calls "micromanaging"
df their operations from Capitol
Hill.
Wilson confirms his role on behalf
of the Afghan resistance but de-
clines to discuss the numbers relat-
ing to his legislative efforts. Wilson
laid in an interview that the new
cannon, with armor-piercing explo-
Live shells, "means there,aren't go-
ing to be any more Soviet helicop-
ters going back to Kabul [the Af-
ghan capital] with holes in them.
They're going down."
Of the covert aid package in-
crease, Wilson said, "We're talking
about peanuts._We're talking about.;.
one B1 bomber. I'd give them five."
(The BIB bomber costs about $200
million.)
Wilson continued, "There were
58,000 dead in Vietnam and we
owe the Russians one and you can
quote me on that .... I have had a
slight obsession with ,it; because of
Vietnam. I thought the Soviets
ought to get a dose of it .... I've
been of the opinion that this money
was better spent to hurt our adver-.
saries than other money in the De-
fense Department budget."
House colleagues and members
of the Senate tell of Wilson's-dog-
ged effort to secure support for the
Afghans and the new antiaircraft
cannon. Sources said that Wilson
even arranged a mule-breeding pro-
gram for the resistance to haul the
new cannon, ammunition and other
supplies into the mountains of Af-
ghanistan.
The sudden mushrooming of aid,
through supply pipelines set up af-
ter the Soviet invasion in December
1979, also has created massive con-
trol problems. By some accounts, as
little as 20 percent of the weapons
and supplies reach the Afghan re-
sistance because the material must
travel through a long, complicated
supply route. The CIA maintains
that 80 percent is getting into the
hands of the fighters.
Government and intelligence re-
ports also show some cases of hu-
man-rights violations by the insur-
.gents. One well-inforfned source
said recently, "There are 70 Rus-
sian prisoners living lives of inde-
scribable horror." Several admin-
istration officials said that the Unit-
ed States is going to have to face
this problem.
According to two sources, the
insurgents have made requests for
assassination equipment and asked
for information on locations of high-
ranking Soviet generals and admin-
istrators. But there are no proven,
clear cases of assassination. The
CIA is prohibited by executive or-
der from supporting assassination
directly or indirectly.
One source said that the resis-
tance is "not going to worry about a
presidential executive order and
they are certainly going to ask for
sniper weapons and if they ask for
them, they're going to get them."
CIA officials said that they have
no way of preventing individual
tribesmen or resistance leaders half
a world away from taking such ac-
tions. "We don't control the oper-
ation," one official said. "We'support
it."
A December 1984 report from
the Helsinki Watch Committee, an
independent human-rights group,
entitled "Tears, Blood and Cries,
Human Rights in Afghanistan Since
the Invasion, 1979 to 1984," de-
scribes terror tactics including tor-
ture and assassination that allegedly
are being used by both sides. The
212-page report devotes 172 pages
to the Soviets and 16 pages to the
resistance; the group apparently
found substantial violations by the
Soviets.
Through all of this, officials said
the government of Pakistani Pres-
ident Mohammed Zia ul-Haq is
walking a diplomatic tightrope be-
cause most of the covert aid is
channeled through his country. Two
key intelligence sources said that
the massive increase in the covert
program gives Zia leverage to de-
mand more U.S. aid for his country.
These sources voiced fears that, in
the extreme, Zia's position might be
so strengthened that he would re-
quest assistance in building his nu-
clear weapons, a goal at odds with
U.S. policy and denied by Pakistan.
Many details of the Afghan co-
vert aid program have been re-
ported since the operation began
during the Carter administration.
But officials said the sudden " in-
crease in the last 18 months and the
lobbying of Wilson with the support
of most members of Congress jave
allowed little time for the adminis-
tration or the Hill to debate the con-
sequences of various tactical deci-
sions, such as the new antiaircraft
cannon, or the funding increases.
Wilson's efforts. began in earnest
after he and then-Rep. Clarence D.
Long (D-Md.), longtime chairman of
the appropriations subcommittee
overseeing foreign aid who was de-
feated last November, returned
from a trip to the Afghan resistance
camps in Pakistan in August 1983.
CIA aid to the insurgents was about
$30 million that year, and the agen-
cy had not requested an increase
for the next fiscal year, according to
sources.
In a recent interview, Long said
the insurgents told him during the
1983 trip that "they wanted some-
thing to knock down helicopters."
He said that Zia agreed the insur-
gents should have improved anti-
aircraft weapons.
At the time, the insurgents had
only machine guns, which often hit
and damaged the Soviet helicopters
but did not have the firepower to
bring them down. In addition, the
Soviet-made SA7, a shoulder-
C;,ritinued
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launched, heat-seeking missile, one
of the items purchased as part of
the covert program, has turned out
to be unreliable.
Long said that Zia suggested a
new cannon and gave its name. "If it
was American-made the Soviets
would trace it to Pakistan and he
[Zia] didn't want that. He suggested
we get [foreign-made] guns ....
He was perfectly willing to take a
chance if it couldn't be traced back
to him," Long said.
As the next step, Long said he
asked Wilson to offer the Afghan aid
increase amendment because Wil-
son was a member of the defense
appropriations subcommittee and a
member of the House-Senate con-
ference committee that worked on
the defense appropriations bill.
Wilson confirmed this, saying, "I
was the instrument of Long's idea."
Wilson said he came up with the
amount for the initial amendment,
and said he did this by pulling a
number "right out of the sky." Oth-
er sources said it was $40 million.
Wilson said he conferred with
some officials at the CIA before, but
they said that "they were shy about
increasing their budget" more than
had been approved by the House
and Senate intelligence committees
for other intelligence matters and
operations. Budget increases usu-
ally come from the authorizing com-
mittees, which, in the case of the
CIA, are the two intelligence com-
mittees. Because he is not a mem-
ber of the House intelligence com-
mittee, Wilson said, "It was the only"
vehicle I had as a member of the
House Appropriations Committee."
Wilson said it is unusual for a con-
gressman to add money to a covert
program and that he knows of no
other such case.
it was an easy sell," he said. Wil-
son reportedly had'no trouble per-
suar';ng the members of the House-
Senate conference committee that
the insurgents were fighting cou-
rageously and were not asking for
food or medicine but some way to
defend themselves against the gun--
ships.
After the House-Senate confer-
ence approved the $40 million
amendment, Office of Management
and Budget Director David A.
Stockman sent a letter late last
February requesting the House and
Senate intelligence comrrlittees to
approve the reprogramming. A
source said that the administration
went along because of belief in the
Afghan program and because it was
a comparatively small amount re-
quested by the House Appropria-
tions Committee, which generally
has supported administration re-
quests for the Pentagon.
The deputy undersecretary of
defense for policy, retired Army
Gen. Richard G. Stilwell, reportedly
objected to the loss of the $40 mil-
lion from the Pentagon, and one
source said that a Defense Depart-
ment study described the new can-
non as the wrong weapon for. a
guerrilla war. '
In March 1984, the House intel-
ligence committee approved a lim-
ited release of the money, while
asking the CIA for a report showing
that the, advantages of the partic-
ular cannon outweighed its disad-
vantages.
On the Senate side, Barry Gold-
water (R-Ariz.), then-chairman of
the Senate intelligence committee,
dug in his heels and refused to ap-
prove release of the money because
he reportedly did not think it was
the right weapon.
But Goldwater changed his mind
in the first week of April 1984 after
Deputy CIA Director John N.
McMahon wrote the Senate and
House committees to say that the
CIA supported use of the weapon.
One official said that the CIA was
not familiar with the particular can-
non and had to obtain one for test-
ing. ,
Both committees then approved a
limited test of nine of the cannons.
15 /
They are due to arrive in several
months on the battlefields in Af-
ghanistan, the sources said, and
more will be provided if the weapon
proves itself.
The cost of each new cannon,
plus transportation and initial sup-
plies of ammunition, is put at about
$1 million. Because the weapons!
are rapid-fire and the armor-pierc-
ing shells they use are expensive,
some estimates suggest that mil-
lions of dollars will have to be spent
to supply enough ammunition each
year. Concern about this expense
and the overall impact the new can-
non may have in Afghanistan was
expressed by a number of Repub-
lican and Democratic members of
the Senate intelligence committee
during a briefing on the matter last
year, according to sources.
Several sources said that there is
no effective countermeasure to the
new cannon. On the other hand, the
Soviets have been able to employ
countermeasures against the SA7
heat-seeking missiles, and many of
those missiles supplied to the insur-
gents have turned out to be duds. I
For his part, Wilson said the can-
non will not amount to an escalation
in Afghanistan, and the Soviets
should be made to pay a high price.
"I think it would be immoral not to
help .... I don't want the resis-
tance fighters to give away their
lives too cheaply."
A number of congressional sup-
porters 'wanted initially to supply
U.S.-made Redeye or Stinger
ground-to-air, heat-seeking mis-
siles, but the CIA blocked that be-
cause those missiles could be traced
too easily to the United States.
Wilson cites. reports showing a
pattern of the brutality of Soviet
operations in Afghanistan, including
massive bombing raids that have
driven millions of Afghan people
across the border to neighboring
countries, especially Pakistan. Wil-
son said that the Soviets have used
booby-trapped toys to maim Afghan
children as part of their terror cam-
paign. Another official confirmed
that there is such an intelligence
report.
Congressional support for the
Afghan covert aid program has
been bipartisan and enthusiastic.
Last fall both houses unanimously
He and Long went ahead with the
amendment with the purpose, ac-
cording to Wilson, "of trying to de-
monstrate that money didn't matter
because it was such a worthy
cause." The first $40 million in-
crease was for clothing, boots, med-
ical supplies and "rapid-fire can- .
nons" for antiaircraft defense,
sources said.
Wilson, who has rpade five trips
to the region, said, "Every trip I
made, the freedom fighters talked
about bullets bouncing off HINDs
[Soviet helicopter gunships] and
how they needed armor-piercing
explosive shells."
G1 r,I mr;va
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passed a resolution saying it should
be U.S. policy "to support effective-
ly the people of Afghanistan in their
fight for freedom." But to protect
Pakistan, the pipeline through
which most aid flows, the program
has been covert and handled by the
CIA.
Though there has been general
agreement that the Afghan oper-
ation is a "good war," there has
been disagreement about its spe-
cific objective, going back to when
the Carter administration began
covertly supplying the insurgents
after the Soviet invasion.
senior official in the Carter ad-
ministration said there were serious
questions from the beginning. "The
question was, do we give them [the
insurgents] weapons to kill them-
selves, because that is what we
would be doing. There was no way
they could beat the Soviets.
"The question here was whether
it was morally acceptable that, in
order to keep the Soviets off bal-
ance, which was the reason for the
operation, it was permissible to use
other lives for our geopolitical in-,-
terests."
General Agreement Remains
Now, five years later, there re-
mains general agreement that the
insurgents cannot win, although the
CIA has reports that the resistance
has done well , in the last eight
months. But supporters of the pro-
gram such as Sen. Wallop are trou-
bled by the lack of clear objectives.
"I don't know anyone who be-
lieves we will overthrow the Soviet-
supported regime in Afghanistan,"
Wallop said, "so what does -anyone
define as success? You have got to
have in mind what you want to do,
and we don't in this case." - -- -
Others criticize CIA management
of the operation. One well-informed
official said that resupplies of guns
and equipment get doled out to the
resistance groups after. successful
operations, almost as rewards, rath-
er than as part of a weA-orches-
trated campaign. "This whole thing
is conceived as a supply operation,
not a war operation," the official
said.
An administration official in-
volved in Afghan policy said, "Our
policy is to get the Soviets out ba-
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sically .... [we] have tied up
about 1 percent of their Army
... and the cost to the Soviets is
about $4 billion a year [and the] to-
tal cost since 1979 is about $16 bil-
lion."
Other sources were skeptical
about these numbers and note that
the Soviets still would have the ex-
pense of maintaining that part of
their army even if there were no
Afghanistan war.
There is another theme that runs
throughout interviews with offi-
cials, one that reflects the delicate
nature of limited war. While de-
flouncing Soviet actions and brutal-
ity, many officials noted,. withvary
ing degrees of emphasis, that the
Soviets have imposed some limits
on their actions.
"One of the important things is
restraint," said one administration
official, "and that includes restraint
on our part ... and restraint by the
Soviet Union. -
"You've got to consider what
they haven't done to Pakistan and
others .... Afghanistan is on their
border, and you have to believe the
Soviets could, if they chose, march
in with sufficient troops to do the
job."
One congressional official called
that statement 'ludicrous," adding,
"This represents the kind of self-de-
lusion according to which the So-
viets and we have an unspoken,
gentleman's agreement to never go
for the jugular.
"Since the Soviets have disproven
this constantly, this view can only
be held through a ' heroic effort of
self-deception," the official said.
Many of those interviewed ex-
pressed concern that the money
and supplies get passed through so
many hands-"a board of Pakistani
generals." in the words of one
source-that the hundreds of mil-
lions of dollars are not accomplish
ing that much......
Alexander Alexiev, a Rand Corp.
analyst who has visited the region
for the Defense Department, said,
"Corruption is rampant .... Some
of the political leaders live in fancy
villas and have fat bank accounts,
while the fighters don't have boots
five years into the war."
He said he talked to one resis-
tance leader who had only a hand-
drawn map of the province that 'was
his home base.
One senior member of the Senate
intelligence committee, who said he
will continue to support the pro-
gram, said, "It's like tossing money
over the garden wall."
Staff researcher Barbara Feinman
contributed to this report.
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Explosives Were Tracked to Lebanon
By Bob Woodward
*W ngtw, Poet sun writer
STAT
_ WASHINGTON POST
18 October 1984
U.S. Had Reliable Warnings
Diplomats Were Bomb Target
In the weeks before this Septem-
ber's terrorist bombing of the
American Embassy annex in Beirut
the U.S. government had specific
reliable intelligence warnings that
txplcsiyes had been shin d into
Lebanon and were targeted against
American Embassy personnel ac-
cording to informed i-ntellivence
sources-
U.S. and Israeli intelligence first
tracked explosives and timed fuse
bombs in mid-August. Days before
the Sept. 20 bombing, they learned
that the explosives were designated
for use against Americans. AA vul-,
nerability assessment narrowed the
possible points of attack to two fa-
cilities in east Beirut: the ambas-
sador's residence in the southern
hills, and the eventual target, the
embassy annex to the north near
the Mediterranean coast.
Reagan administration officials
who have reviewed the intelligence
and the details of the attack have
found that the failure to take more
aressive securit cautions w-a-s
even more unsatisfactory t an first
repat . One o ficial ca a it in-
excusable" and another "negligent."
Sources said that too many U.S.
security forces were deployed away
from the annex, where the most
American personnel were sta-
tioned.
The analysis of security after the
bombing shows that terrorists on
Sept. 20 could have had unimpeded
access to the embassy from a side
'road that ran about 200 feet from
the annex. No barricades were in
place there. Fortunately, the
sources said, the driver of the van
carrying the explosives approached
the building through the front gate
and was slowed down along that
route by security guards and by
concrete barriers around which he
had to weave.
The explosives were detonated
30 feet before the van reached the
annex, making the damage and
death toll less than they might have
been.
Sources said the new information
about security lapses accounts in
part for Secretary of State George
P. Shultz's directive last week that
he receive a daily briefing on em-
bassy safety as part of a "full-court
press" on new security measures.
In addition, the sources said in-
telligence reports show that some
of the explosives are still-
and another attack is a q -
pated before the American resi-
dential election. U.S. aut onties,
according to one source, most fear
another attack against precisely the
same target.
Under new security measures, all
vehicles other than the ambassa-
dor's automobile entering the em-
bassy annex in Beirut are stopped.
Passengers and deliveries are then
loaded into a shuttle service that
runs from the gates to the annex,
these officials said.
U.S. intelligence, working with
friendly intelligence services includ
ing those of Israel and Lebanon,
have traced the financing of the ex-
plosives to an elusiv finans financial rt,id-
dieman with close ties to Iranians
who have supported terrorism in
the past.
The middleman is identified as
jiassan ai a Lebanese with
high-level contacts in the Iranian
government__ Hamm, _ wya s paid
S50,000 as part of the operation
supporting the October 1983 bomb.
ing at Marine headquarters in_flei.
rut t a,L,jjaed 241. acor ing to
intelligence reports
Qnbnuad
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2.
Hamiz is closely associated with
Hussein Musawi, a leader of one
faction of Shiite militants in Leba.
non's Bekaa Valley. Musawi's cous-
in, Abu Haydar Musawi was in.
volved in obtaining the pickup truck
used in the 1983 Marine bombing,
according to intelligence reports.
He heads his cousin's group called
'Hussein suicide commandos,' the
reports say.
Intelligence has also established
the identity of the driver of he van
that carried the explosives in the
most recent bombin.The driver
apparently had two or three aliases,
but officials said he has been traced
to the militant Shiite movement
called Hezballah, or Party of God,
which previously has been identified
as the group responsible for the
terrorist attack.
The group is a loose confedera-
tion. Sources this week cautioned
that intelligence data, though con-
crete and believed to be reliable, is
not strong enough to make a case in
co-
Last January the Israelis arrested
12 terrorists, including some mem.
bers of the Party of God, and ob-
tained documents, money, oper-
ational structures and target infor.
mation. But it is difficult for outsid.
ers to get good information from
the militant Shiite movements, par-
ticularly in advance. "It's like pen-
etrating the top echelon of the
Mafia," one source said.
This uncertainty, according to
sources, is a major reason the Rea-
gan administration has decided not
to retaliate.
The sources said the CIA is mor
interested in learning about the ter-
rorists, their financing and commu-
nication, than in striking back.
Though the CIA learned of the ex-
p osives shipment and a posse e
targets, officials said they did not
know the timing of a possible at-
tack. "We didn't know when-
whether it was going to be that
week or month," one source said.
Mother official said intelligence
'warnings without the time element
can lose inpact. creating what one
official called "the cry-wolf -
prob-lem.-Sources in several western Intel-
,enc agencies said this week at
S
riii n intelli ence officers have not
been im licated in the latest attac ,
unlike the 1983 Marine born m?
and the April 1983 bombing of the
U.S. Embassy in Lebanon.
Among the 13 individuals tied to
those two earlier bombings were a
Syrian intelligence colonel, a for-
mer PLO security officer and oth-
ers belonging to the Syrian-con-
trolled Thunderbolt terrorist organ-
ization.
The absence of Syrian intelli-
gence assistance, according to one
source, may in part account for the
comparatively low death toll of last
month's bombing, in which two
Americans and at least 10 Lebanese
were killed.
The CIA is continuing its inves-
tigation to learn more about those
responsible for last month's bomb-
MS. capacity to undertake such
a probe has been enhanced sion+f.
icantly since the 1983 incidents. An
information exchange network has
been set up with the intelligence
services. police and military of
tAOre than 1O(1 rn~es.
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Next 2 Page(s) In Document Denied
Iq
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F.~ WASHINGTON POST
~TI2LS :Y` f 12 May 1985
0% ?AGE lam'
STAT
STAT
Antiterrorist Plan Rescinded After
Set LIP to Preempt Strikes at U.S. Facilities in Mideast
on )111(y
Unauthorized n
Sources Say y Reagan Approved CIA Covert Training and Support of Squads
y Bob Woodward and Charles R. Babcock
wunmren Post Suff wrner!
Late last year. President Reagan ap-
proved a covert operation directing the
Central Intelligence Agency to train and
support several counterterrorist units for
strikes against suspected terrorists before
they could attack U.S. facilities in the Mid-
dle East, according to informed sources.
About four months later. members of one
of those units. composed of Lebanese intel-
ligence personnel and other foreigners, act-
ing without CIA authorization, went out on
a runaway mission and hired others in Leb-
anon to detonate a massive car bomb out-
side the Beirut residence of a militant Shiite
leader believed to be behind terrorist at-
tacks on U.S. installations. the sources said.
'More than 80 persons were killed and
200 wounded in the car bombing in a Beirut
suoura on March S. The suspected terrorist
leader escaped injury.
Faced with an indirect connection to the
car bombing. alarmed CIA and Reagan ad-
ministration offic;is quickly canceled the
entire covert support operation. the
sources said.
CIA personnel had no contact with those
who actually carried out the car bombing.
they said. According to one source, officials
of the intelligence agency were upset that
one of its most secret and much debated
operations had gone astray.
Administration spokesmen had no com-
ment yesterday: --
Several intelligence sources said the in-
c:aent revealed the hazards of trying to
fight the ".....y'' war of terrorism. Others
questioned whether training and support of
the coven units might have violated the
longstanding prohibition against U.S. in-
volvement in assassinations. One source.
skeptical of the short-lived operation. called
it "an illustration of how some people learn
things the hard way."
Another source said Defense Department
officials refused two years ago to give Leb-
anese units any counterterrorism training
because of fears that "we'd end up with hit
teams over there .... The concern was
that when some have the capability it can
be turned upside down and used offensively.
The concern was that one faction would use
it on the other factions.'
Administration sources said that the con-
gressional oversight committees on intel-
ligence were briefed on the covert support
operation in Lebanon after the president
approved it late last year, although Reagan
specifically directed that only the chairmen
and vice chairmen of the Senate and House
intelligence committees be informed.
Several sources said there is some ques-
tion whether the new chairmen and vice
chairmen who took over the committees in
both chambers in January receivec full
briefings on the operation. Administration
sources last week insisted that they had.
Within weeks of the March 8 car bomb-
ing and the cancellation of the covert oper-
ation in Lebanon, both Robert C.McFar-
lane, the president's national security af-
..,,, euvi3cl, dim %..iit u7rector William J.
Casey gave speeches saying the adminis-
tration had the capability to preempt ter-
rorist attacks.
Using the same language, both McFar-
lane and Casey said: "We cannot and will not
abstain iron forcible action to prevent, pre-
empt or respond to terrc:ist acts '9'.-ere
conditions merit the use of force. Many
countries, including the United States. have
the specific fthrces and capabilities we need
to carry out operations against terrorist
groups.
It could not be learned exactly what ca-
pabilitaes Mcrariane and Casey were talk-
ing about. The CIA has extensive world-
wide counterterrorist training operations
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designed to help otner nations de-
fend against and react to terrorist
attacks. McFarlane and Casey have
declined to elaborate. McFarlane's
speech was given here on March 25
and. Casey's in Cambridge, Mass.,
on April 17.
Dozens of bystanders were killed
and wounded in the March 8 car
t
u
b
b
b
? The plan to form and train three
teams of Lebanese capable of ncu-
tializng or disabling terrorists be-
fore they could make planned at-
acks on American targets was ap-
roved after years of internal debate
and increasingly tough Reagan ad-
rrirnistration rhetoric about how to
respond to the wave of Devastating
..-;*T ene.,c ,i...',4
o
a
ur
bombing in a Beirut su
50 yards from the residence of Mo- Preemptive Strikes Difficult
harmed Hussein Fadlallah. - leader
of -the Hezballah (Party of God), a
mi;itant Shiite movement. A num-
ber of Fadlallah's bodyguards re-
portedly were killed in the explo-
sion.
No one publicly has claimed re-
sponsibility for the bombing. Some
Shiites accused the Israelis, who
denied any involvement.
Numerous U.S. intelligence re-
ports have tied Fadlallah directly to
the series of terrorist attacks on
American facilities in Lebanon in
1983 and 1984. According to one
report, Fadlallah participated in an
Oct. 20, 1983. planning meeting of
terrorists in Damascus. Syria, three
days before the suicide bombing of
the Marine headquarters compound
in Beirut that killed 241 U.S. ser-
vicemen. Intelligence reports also
say that on the night of Oct. 22,
1983, just hours before the bomb-
ing, Fadlallah received and blessed
the man who drove the truck car-
rying the explosives in the suicide
bombing.
?Fadlaliah's group also was re-
sponsible for the more recent Sept.
20, 1984, bombing of the U.S. Em-
bissy annex in Beirut, according to
intelligence sources. Fadlallah has
denied involvement in these terror-
ist actions.
:A Lebanese intelligence source
said: "My service did the [March 81
Fadlallah bombing. I believe it was
done to show we are strong ....
You've got to stop terrorism with
terrorism." -
:The Lebanese source said that
the CIA would have nothing to do
with a car bomb because of the dan-
ger to innocent people. But the
source. contended that the CIA
knew it was being planned.
- U.S. sources emphatically denied
any advance knowledge of the
bombing and said immediate steps
v ere taken after it occurred to can-
, cel the entire covert operation.
::The covert training and support
program was set up under a pres-
idential "finding" signed by Reagan.
It: specified that the teams of for-
eigners were to be used only with
great care and only in situations
where the United States had good
iatelligence that a terrorist group
was about to strike. The teams
were supposed to use the minimal
force necessary to stop specific at-
tacks. Several sources said this in-
cluded the authority to kill sus-
pected terrorists if that was the
only alternative.
:Conducting preemptive strikes is
very difficult in practice, because
they depend on intelligence infor-
mation that is timely and accurate.
However, sources said the U.S. ca-
pability to collect advance informa-
tion on planned terrorist actions is
improving.
. After previous terrorist attacks
on American facilities in the Middle
East. U.S. officials learned they had
had some clues, at times significant
ones, before the event. But they
were only discovered afterward,
when analysts sorted through raw
intelligence reports, corr. nunica-
tiors intercepts and satellite pho-
man getting off the first shot at a
man poinung a shotgun at him."
Secretary of State George P.
Shultz and national security affairs
adviser McFariane were chief pro-
ponents of the cover- plan in Leb-
anon, sources said.
Shultz Urged Response
"State and the White House
pushed this," one source said. Ac-
cording to this source, the final de-
cision to approve the plan late last
fall was made because of "Shultz's
assertiveness and [Defense Secre-
tary Caspar W.] Weinberger's re-
luctance to use force convention-
ally, and McFarlane's anger with
terrorism."
Sources said that McFarlane was
instrumental in developing a con-
sensus from the disparate views of
senior administration officials.
Shultz repeatedly has urged a
strong response to terrorism, which
he has called "barbarism that
threatens the very foundations of
civilized life." On the other hand,
Weinberger has voiced reluctance
to use military force without full
public support.
Sources said that some senior
intelligence officials opposed involv-
ing the intelligence agencies in
what one official called "the ulti-
mate covert action: an undercover
hit squad." The revelations of pre-
vious assassination plots and the
more recent public and congres-
sional criticism of the CIA's involve-
ment in a covert war against the
leftist Sandinista government in
Nicaragua made the CIA reluctant
to undertake new operations, ac-
cording to the sources.
The covert option was selected,
the sources said,. as a preferable
alternative to the use of military
force such as the guns of the bat-
tleship New Jersey or air strikes,
which could kill or injure innocent
civilians close to a terrorist camp.
The sources also said that train-
ing and supporting a covert team
would avoid the possibility of live
television coverage of U.S. military
action and the visible use of Amer-
ican force in the Middle East, which
previously had increased anti-
American sentiment and more acts
of terrorism. Compared with the
alternatives, the sources said, a
small team also would be the most
Officials said the short-lived co-
vert operation in Lebanon did not
violate the presidential ban on in-
volvement of U.S. personnel. di-
rectly or indirectly, in any type of
assassination planning or operation.
The prohibition dates to 1976, after
congressional investigations uncov-
ered such plots against Cuban Pres-
ident Fidel Castro and other foreign
leaders.
Reagan administration officials
reasoned that killing terrorists was
"preemptive self-defense" rather
than assassination, according to one
source, who said, "Knocking off a
guy who is about to kill you is no
more assassination than a police-_
QKW
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Two weeks after the unautho-
rized March 8 Beirut car bombing
aimed at Fadlallah, McFarlane gave
his speech that seemed to confirm
the existence of some type of new
counterterrorist capability. McFar-
lane said that in making a decision
to react. "we need not insist on ab-
solute evidence that the targets
were used solely to support terror-
ism."
In his speech, "Terrorism and the
Future of Free Society," McFarlane
said he was outlining the "operating
principles" of a presidential direc-
tive on terrorism. "Whenever we
obtain evidence that an act of ter-
rorism is about to be mounted
against us, we have a responsibility
to take measures to protect our
citizens, property and interests,"
McFarlane said.
"Use of force in self-defense is
legitimate under interna:.onal law,"
he said. It is explicitly sanctioned
under Article 51 of the United Na-
tions charter."
Sources said this speech and one
given by Shultz on Dec. 9 in New
York. "The Ethics of Power," were
intended to express the rationale
for administration policy.
Addressing an audience at Yeshi-
va University, Shultz said: 'The
Talmud upholds the universal law of
elf-defense, saying, 'If one comes to
kill you, make haste and kill him
first.' Clearly, as long as threats
exist, law-abiding nations have the
right and indeed the duty to protect
themselves."
According to the sources. Reagan
approved the covert "finding" au-
thorizing CIA training and support
for antiterrorist units in Lebanon
just before Shultz gave the speech
last December.
Mock-Up of Embassy Seen
Two sources said that the Sept.
=0 terrorist bombing of the U.S.
Embassy annex in Beirut last year
helped persuade officials that they
had to develop some means of pre-
empting planned terrorist attacks.
After the fact, officials learned that
U.S. intelligence agencies had over-
head satellite photographs of what
is thought to be the van used in the
suicide bombing.
Those photos showed the vehicle
outside a mock-up of the embassy
annex that the terrorists were us-
ing for a practice run, sources said.
Although the connection was estab-
lished after the fact, the sources
said that, in the future, this kind of
intelligence might be part of the
basis for a preemptive attack.
One source argued that the de-
cision to use a covert team
amounted to recreating for the CIA
a roie it played in its early years.
before the Watergate scandal and
subsequent congressional investi-
gations of the agency dampened its
ardor for clandestine operations.
Accordingly, this source said,
Reagan's decision to authorize the
covert team was "the final curtain
or. the legacy of both Vietnam and
Watergate." Of all the Reagan ad-
ministration's decisions on national
security, this source said, "It was
the most tricky, the most contro-
versial and sensitive .... [It) took
the most goading to get change."
But when the operation went
astray after the Lebanese went
ahead with an unapproved car-
bombing, officials involved in the
plan felt they had no alternative to
canceling U.S. support for the an-
titerrorist squads.
One official who favored creation
of the units said: if you take ter-
rorism seriously, as we must,
you've got to realize that it could
get worse .... if we had informa-
tion on some terrorists involved in
nuclear detonation practice, you've
got to act. No choice. That is the
type of issue we are going to have
to face, and we better be ready."
Staff researcher Barbara Feinnian
contributed to this report.
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 STAT
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Next 4 Page(s) In Document Denied
Iq
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OM P-~L~+j--
Shultz Labels Report
By Post `Blind.A.Ite'?'
Secretary of State George P.
Shultz said yesteroav that a report
u h_e asn ngton Post about a
U.S. counterterrorist program that
was terminated after an unautho-
rtzea c,ar-bOmn blast in Lebanon is
"a blind alley.'
"It?s absolutely a blind alley ... a
story that's created a big hubbub
about something that's not cor-
rect,' Shultz said.
Questioned further, he said. "I
don't want to get into it because I
just haven't been able to inform my-
self well enough."
Until now he had declined all
comment on the store. nen some-
on-- mentioned the Lentra; inte i-
?ence Aeency's denial as oeint pro
forma Snultz responoec,. 1! the
CIA denies something. it's denied:
STAT
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ARTICLE
as PAGE,
CIA Denies Part in Bombing
Agency Criticizes Pbst Article on Beirut Attack That Killed 80
By Charles R. Babcock
and Bob Woodward
W,th,n ton Post Staff Wntun
The Central Intelligence Agency
says it was not involved in a Beirut
car bombing that killed 80 people in
March, and has criticized a Wash-
ington Post article last month on
the incident.
The Post's May 12 article said
that President Reagan directed the
CIA late last year to train and sup-
port counterterrorist units, made
up of Lebanese and other foreign-
ers, for strikes against suspected
terrorists before they could attack
U.S. targets.
The story said that in March,
members of one of those units, "act-
ing without CIA authorization, went
out on a runaway mission and hired
others in Lebanon" to plant a car
bomb outside the residence of a
militant Shiite leader believed by
intelligence sources to be behind
terrorist attacks on U.S. installa-
tions.
The story said "CIA personnel
had no contact with those who ac-
tually carried out" the bombing. But
t added that "faced with an indirect
-rumection to the car bombing,"
U .S. officials canceled the support
operation.
l"ne CIA, in a letter to The Post
by .pokesman George V. Lauder,
;;ubiished in the letters column to-
day, said the story "gave the Amer
,can public and the rest of the work
the totally false impression that the
f'.S. government was involved in
terrorist activity.
This misleading theme has been
picked up by a number of other
journalists as fact and has even
been cited by the Shiite terrorists
as one of the motives for hijacking
TWA Flight 847."
The letter comes as administra-
tion officials are concerned that
some hostages from the hijacked
plane are reportedly in the hands of
the group headed by the target of
the March 8 bombing, Mohammed
Hussein Fadlallah, leader of the
Hezbollah (Party of God) militant
Shiite faction.
Fadlallah, who was unharmed,
has been tied in U.S. intelligence
reports to the bombings of the Ma-
rine headquarters, that killed 241 in
1983 and the bombing of the U.S.
Embassy annex last fall.
The CIA letter to The Post added
that a House intelligence commit-
tee review of the incident concluded
on June 12 that there was no CIA
complicity in the bombing.
Two members of the committee
said yesterday that the report did
not directly address The Post ar-
ticle.
The report, they said, dealt with
a resolution by House members
who accused the CIA of financing
hit teams because of the bombing.
That resolution demanded CIA doc-
uments about the bombing.
Senior CIA and administration
officials, before and after The Post
article was published, confirmed the
details.
One senior CIA official said the
rticle was accurate, but he had a
~roblem with "the way it got picked
p ... as if we had our own hit
earn out there."
CIA Director William J. Casey
said in an interview in U.S. News &
World Report last week that the
Lebanese had asked the CIA "to
help plan preemptive action. Before
the bombing we were ready to con-
sider helping them with planning of
that sort of action if they did it in a
surgical, careful, well-targeted
way-if they really knew what they
were doing."
Me said that the CIA had given
the Lebanese training and technical
support to deal with terrorism. "But
they do any operations themselves,"
Casey said. "We were not involved,
and no one we trained was involved
in the Lebanese car-bombing oper-
ation."
Asked in the U.S. News inter.
view if the March 8 bombing led to
a change of policy, as The Post and
other news organizations reported,
Casey said, "Well, we didn't like the
way that situation was handled. So
we pulled back from any involve-
ment in the planning or preparation
of operations."
CIA spokesman Lauder could not
be reached for comment yesterday.
CIA spokesman Patti Volz said the
letter was not written until Friday,
nearly six weeks after the story,
because the CIA just learned about
the House committee report. She
said she "wouldn't address" ques-
tions on whether the letter was part
of any administration effort to send
a message to the TWA hijackers.
Several other publications, in-
cluding The New York Times, The
Wall Street Journal, Newsweek and
the Los Angeles Times, and CBS
News later carried similar stories of
the birth and cancellation of the
administration's counterterrorism
program in Beirut.
nn his letter, Lauder said the CIA
categorically denied any involve-
ment with the bombing both before
and after the article was published,
and The Post ignored the denials.
The Post article said administration
spokesmen had no comment before
publication.
The Post carried the public CIA
denial in the middle of an article
about congressional inquiries-into
the matter.
Lauder also quoted from the
House report that said its review
"leads to the conclusion that no U.S.
government complicity, direct or
indirect, can be established with
respect to the March 8 bombing in
Beirut."
STAT
STAT
STAT
STAT
Cs nued
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a.
The House report is a public doc-
ument, but was not printed in the
Congressional Record or distribut.
ed to reporters, a committee staff
member said. It said the committee
review uncovered no evidence that
government agencies "encouraged
or participated in any terrorist ac-
tivity in Lebanon."
It also said the committee discov-
ered no evidence that U.S. intelli-
gence had foreknowledge of the
bombing.
The Post article was headlined:
"Antiterrorist Plan Rescinded After
Unauthorized Bombing." It did not
say the CIA knew about or encour-
aged the bombing.
In the U.S. News interview,
Casey also said he did not believe
planning an operation that was like-
ly to kill people amounted to assas-
sination, which is illegal under U.S.
law.
"If the Lebanese discharge their
duty to protect the lives and prop-
erty of their citizens as well as oth-
er nationals, and if in the course of
doing that someone gets killed, are
we assassinating that guy? No.
We're helping the Lebanese per-
form a security function.
"If someone gets killed or hurt,
well, it's a rough game. If you don't
resist and take protective action
against terrorists because you wor-
ry that there's going to be some-
body who might say, 'Ah, that's as-
sassination,' then terrorists can
own the world, because nobody's
going to do anything against them." ;
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WASHINGTON POST
13 January 1987
Soviet Threat Toward Iran
Overstated, Casey Concluded
By Bob Woodward and Dan Morgan
WMIIII11lIooI i'o.t ?r q1 Wnl. r.
the Russians are not coming to
Iran."
Another source who recently re-
CIA Director William J. Casey viewed the SNIE added, "It said the
concluded in a revised intelligence Russian threat was not that great, that the
assessment last spring that the So. Soviets were not about to jump into Iran
viets were less likely to attack Iran .... The urgency of the Fuller study had
or have influence in a post-Kho- abated."
meini regime than the CIA believed
in 1985, according to informed
sources.
Casey's amended analysis ap-
pears to have called into question a
primary White [louse rationale for
the secret sale of U.S. arms to Iran,
which President Reagan ordered in
January 1986 partly to assist Iran
against "intervention by the Soviet
Union."
The 1986 Central Intelligence
Agency assessment, called a Special
National Intelligence Estimate
(SNIE), was issued under Casey's
name and endorsed by the heads of
U.S. intelligence agencies. As such,
it was intended to represent the
best collective judgment of these
agencies.
Casey has taken great pride in
the formal intelligence estimates,
having said repeatedly that they
help guide administration policy,
according to informed sources.
The 25-page, highly classified
document substantially altered con-
clusions reached a year earlier by
one of Casey's national intelligence
officers. Graham Fuller, that there
was a great threat to Iran from its
Soviet neighbor. According to
sources, Fuller's paper also stated
that the Iranian government was
weakening; the analysis emphasised
efforts being made by the Soviet
Union to gain influence in Iran.
Casev's revised assessment was
The Tudeh communist party, which Aya-
tollah Ruhollah Khomeini had outlawed in
1983, was inactive in Iran and seemed to
have little influence, the SNIE concluded.
Some of this assessment was based on
intelligence provided by the Iranian con-
tacts being used by the National Security
Council in the arms deal-the 'moderates'
the White House believed existed in the
Khomeini regime.
It could not be established why the CIA
decided to issue a revised SNIE last spring.
The revision was undertaken at a time
when some government analysts were
skeptical of Fuller's earlier study and
wanted a more comprehensive followup stu-
dy.
Also in the spring of 1983 when the
Tudeh party was closed down, the CIA se-
cretly provided a list to the Khomeini re-
gime of Soviet KGB agents and collabo-
rators operating in Iran, sources told The
Washington Post last year. Two hundred
suspects were executed, 18 Soviet diplo-
mats were expelled and the Tudeh party
leaders were imprisoned. Well-placed
sources said that Soviet influence in Iran
has been insignificant since the Tudeh party
was outlawed.
In another development yesterday relat-
ed to the Iran affair, the chairman and rank-
ing Republican member of the Senate Se-
lect Committee on Intelligence said they
hoped to release a new report on its inquiry
into the Iran-contra affair in the next two
weeks.
issued to the White House before Sen. William S. Cohen (R-Maine) and the
perhaps the most dramatic of the committee's new Democratic chairman,
arms shipments to Iran in May Sen. David L. Boren (Okla.), said the panel
1986, when former national secu- planned to issue a shortened version of the
rity adviser Robert C. McFarlane report that the committee voted on Jan. 5
flew to Tehran with weapons in not to make public in the waning hours of
hopes of freeing U.S. hostages held the 99th Congress.
by Iran-backed Lebanese extrem- The Maine Republican said this versi n
fists in Beirut.
One senior would probably contain a summary of the
who read the revised e administration t estimate official ffi said cial evidence, and "perhaps" a summary of the
yesterday, "It essentially said that conclusions, including an assertion that the
committee had uncovered no evidence to
this point that Reagan knew of a diversion
of funds from Iran arms sales to rebels
fighting the Nicaraguan government.
However, Cohen said during a luncheon
meeting with reporters, the report would
make clear that the committee had con-
ducted only a "preliminary inquiry,' not a
formal investigation, and had not taken tes-
timony from a number of key witnesses.
Cohen, who became vice chairman of the
newly constituted intelligence committee in
the new Congress, was the only Republican
to vote against release of the earlier version
of the report, portions of which have been
widely reported. He said he did so because
the report was not complete, the testimony
of 12 witnesses had not been transcribed
and the senators had not had a chance to
examine all documents submitted by gov-
ernment agencies.
Cohen also expressed concern that re-
lease of the full 160-page report drafted by
the committee staff would have tipped off
potential future witnesses about the nature
of testimony provided by others, thus pos-
sibly hindering subsequent inquiries.
Also yesterday, the CIA strongly denied a
New York Times report that Iran and Iraq
were fed "disinformation"--deliberately
distorted or inaccurate U.S. intelligence
data-to advance the Reagan administra-
tion's goals in the region. The article "is
false," said CIA spokesman George Lauder.
who said it would be "stupid" for the United
States to provide false information to either
side.
The Times report said the disinformation
was provided to prevent either side from
winning their bloody war, now in its seventh
year.
One congressional source yesterday said
that American intelligence, which was
passed to Iran as a sign of "good faith" in
efforts to free U.S. hostages, was generally
accurate except for one occasion when "the
Iraqi forces were described as stronger
than they really were so that the Iranians
would not attack."
Secretary of State George P. Shultz,
traveling from Nigeria to the Ivory Coast
yesterday, said of the disinformation
charge, "That's news to me. So far as I
know, any information that we've been giv-
ing to Iraq has been dead on the mark."
In other developments:
^ David M. Abshire, the president's special
counsel on the Iran affair, met with Reagan
yesterday and the White House later issued
a statement saying Abehire discussed his
objective of speeding up disclosure of infor-
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oration to Congress, the independent coun-
sel investigating the Iran-contra affair and
the Tower Commission, which is reviewing
the NSC. The statement said Abshire also
discussed efforts to maintain a "bipartisan
focus" during the inquiries. A spokesman
said Abshire had no timetable for releasing
information, and the statement made no
mention of releasing details to the public.
^ The U.S. attorney in Manhattan said yes-
terday that independent counsel Lawrence
E. Walsh does not wish to take over the
case of 13 international businessmen ac-
cused of conspiring to sell more than $2 bil-
lion in weapons to Iran.
The defendants in the case, who include a
lawyer for Saudi billionaire Adnan Kha-
shoggi and a retired Israeli army general,
have argued that they believed their pro-
Posed sales would receive U.S. government
approval, and have suggested links between
individuals involved in the sting operation
and those involved in the administration's
arms sales.
U.S. District Court Judge Leonard B.
Sand, who is handling the Iranian arms sting
case, had asked prosecutors to inform him
by yesterday whether Walsh planned to as-
sume control of that prosecution as well as
other contra-related probes that he has ta-
ken over.
Staff writers David B. Ottaway, David
Hoffman, Ruth Marcus and Walter Pincus
and researcher Barbara Fein man
contributed to this report.
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1'
WASHINGTON POST
11 January 1987
NSA Intercepts Show
Millions Are Missing
In Iran Arms Sales
White Home Ranted
Shipments Monitored
By Bob Woodward
W-kno n trv staff veneer
Congressional investigators have
assembled a six-inch stack of Na-
tional Security Agency communi-
cations intercepts that show m&
lions of dollars were "either missing
or slipping through the cracks" in
the Israeli and U.S. arms shipments
to Iran, according to an informed
source.
As the arms sales operation was
getting off the ground in September
1985, Lt. Col. Oliver L. North of
the National Security Council staff
requested that the NSA intercept
telephone calls and messages of
some of the main arms dealers and
middlemen, sources said. This was
because the White House wanted to
monitor the transactions and be.
cause U.S. officials, including
North, were suspicious of the mid-
dlemen.
In this era of microwave and sat-
ellite transmission of international
telephone calls, the NSA has ex-
traordinary ability to intercept
phone conversations and other com-
munications of specific persons by
using computers to sort through
information picked out of the air-
waves and elsewhere.
Though the intercepts do not in.
dicate that the missing nk=iW was
being diverted to aid the cootras
fighting the govt of I$icara-
gua, the documents vividly demon-
strate that the Reagan adoisistra-
tion had evidence it was involved
with some shady and unreliable
arms dealers, the sources said.
Several sources said the congres-
sional investigators were surprised
to learn that the Reagan adminis-
tration would trust the middlemen
with information about and of its
most secret operations while refus-
~8onee
~e yejce committees,
In authorizing d recd' U.S. aaoi
shipments to Iran, President Rer
gam said in a lan. 17, 1996, inter
liigeace order that "dire to its ex
treme sensitivity and security risks,
I determine it is essential to limit
prior notice and direct the director
of central intelligence to refrain
from reporting this finding to the
Congress , , .. "
The intercepts show squabbling
and unhappiness among the arms
dealers and middlemen because of
delayed payments and confusing
payment procedures involving se-
cret numbered bank accounts in
Switzerland used by the Central
Intelligence Agency, Israel and the
arms dealers themselves.
"It was obvious from the begin-
ning in September 1985 that there
were financial problems and unhap-
piness galore," said one source.
As soon as the White House be-
came involved in approving Israeli
arms shipments-to Iran in the fall of
1985, the sources said, North re-
quested NSA "coverage" of the
arms dealers. Manucher Ghorbani-
far, an Iranian go-between who was
probably the key player in arrang-
ing the arms transactions, was tar-
geted by NSA, the highly secret
intelligence agency that has the
That was the day the White
House announced that North had
been fired from the NSC staff and
his boss, Vice Adm. John M. Poin-
dexter, Reagan's national security
adviser, had resigned.
Sources said that in oqe example
the intercepts and other intelli-
gence showed that Ghorbanifar
charged $3 million in interest on a
shipment of arms last spring. This
was the transaction in which Saudi
Arabian business Adnan Khashoggi,
a group of Canadians and another
Arab who has not been identified
Put up $15 million. The $3 million
in interest was charged on the $15
million for 30 days, a rate of 20 per-
cent per month, the sources said.
In the first shipment involving
508 TOW antitank missiles that
went to Iran in September 1985,
the sources said Khashoggi depos.
ited $5 million in an Israeli Swiss
account as a "bridge" loan. Evidence-
available to investigators shows
Iran at paid KKh t gg, was repaid,
th
for the
missiles, but Israel received only
about $2
5 nati
f
.
on
or the w
eapons,
cepting communications, the leaving at least $3.5 million as pro(_
sources said.
North it to Israeli middlemen and Ghor-
made the re uest for NS banifar.
covers a to tar ea en the In the November 1985 shipment
CIA s nations Intel ' we o r of 120 Hawk missiles, the sources
for counterterrorism, ces said
It said Iran put up 'about $42 million
as aocrov by egos ppis,
he arms dealers but only $18 million of that was paid
and t went on a ri- to Israel, which supplied
ortty watc tst o communications ons. As of mid- the weep.
to m er tra
to December 1985,
1 Z
CIA necessary, $24 million was in a Swiss account
an o tot
and t
familiar
with the inter.
cepts said that the NSA analysts
accustomed to reviewing such com-
munications found nothing neces-
sarily unusual because millions of
dollars frequently is siphoned off in
commissions and other payments
when large quantities of sophisti-
cated arms are sold or transferred.
But apparently investigators
working with Attorney General Ed-
win Meese III last, November re-
viewed the intercepts and became
suspicious that something unusual
was happening with the money used
in the arms shipments.
In a nationally televised news
conference Nov. 25, Meese said,
"In the course of a thorough review
of a number of intercepts and other
materials, this-the hint of a pos-
sibility that there was some monies
being made available for some other
Purpose-came to our attention."
a and investigators have been unable
to
to determine what happened to it.
most advanced methods for inter-
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~~ -~ ~1w~~IR~D 1 WASHINGTON POST
15 Decemter 1986
CIA Aiding ' Iraq i
n Gulf
War
7hrget Data From U.S. Satellites Supplied for Nearly 2 Years
By Bob Woodward
Wash,ngton Pmt Staff Writer
The Central Intelligence Agency
has been secretly supplying Iraq
with detailed intelligence, including
data from sensitive U.S. satellite
reconnaissance photography, to as-
sist Iraqi bombing raids on Iran's oil
terminals and power plants in the
war between the two nations, ac-
cording to informed sources.
The information has been flowing.
to Iraq for nearly two years. During
the same period, the Reagan admin-
istration was secretly selling arms
to Iran in an effort to free the
American hostages in Lebanon and
gain influence with factions in the
Iranian government.
In August, the CIA stepped up
the initiative with Iraq by establish-
ing a direct, top-secret Washington-
Baghdad link to provide the Iraqis
with better and more timely satel-
lite information. One source with
firsthand knowledge said the Iraqis
receive the information from sat-
ellite photos "several hours" after a
bombing raid in order to assess
damage and plan the next attack.
This source said the intelligence
information is "vital" to Iraq's con-
duct of the war.
CIA Director William J. Casey
met twice this fall-once in Octo-
ber and again in November-with
senior Iraqi officials to make sure
the new channel was functioning
and to encourage more attacks on
Iranian installations, the sources
said.
Iraq has mounted a series of pre-
cision air attacks against Iran in
recent months, concentrating on oil
terminals, oil pumping stations and
power plants-all with the intent of
destroying Iran's economy and its
ability to continue the war, which
entered its seventh year this fall.
The revelation that the admin-
istration has been sharing intelli-
gence data with the Iraqis at the
same time that it was shipping arms
to the Iranians raises new questions
about the adm,inistration's policy on
the Persian Gulf war.
One well-placed U.S. government
official said that the administration
policy of arms for Iran and satellite
mhteltigence for Iraq was "a cynical
attempt to engineer a stalemate" in
the war.
An administration official , said
yesterday that any intelligence as-
sistance to Iraq was for "defensive"
purposes, designed to keep either
side from winning or losing the war.
White House spokesman Daniel
Howard said yesterday there would
be no comment on this report. "We
don't comment on intelligence mat-
ters," he said.
On Nov. 13, in his first detailed
public statement on the Iranian af-
fair, President Reagan said one of
the key goals of his Iranian initiative
was "to bring an honorable end to
the bloody six-year war between
Iran and Iraq." Denying a "tilt" in
U.S. policy, Reagan said his admin-
istration did not favor or support
"one side over the other."
Since the secret U.S.-Iranian
arms deal was disclosed in early
November, Iraq has stepped up its
attacks. On Nov. 25, Iraqi war-
planes bombed Iranian oil tankers at
Larak Island, which is about 750
miles south of Iraq and in the Strait
of Hormuz. This was apparently the
greatest distance flown by Iraqi
planes in any raid during the war.
On Dec. 5 the warplanes bombed
Iran's Neka power station, which is
located close to Iran's Soviet bor-
der.
On Saturday, Iraqi radio reported
that its warplanes attacked Tehran
for the first time in seven months,
striking an antiaircraft defense sys-
tem and a power plant, and in a sep-
arate raid hit troop concentrations,
and ammunition depots in north-
western Iran.
Intelligence estimates show that
Iraq overall has at least a 4-to-1.
advantage in the major types of mil-
itary equipment including tanks.
missiles, and combat aircraft. Iraq
also has about 1 million regular
ground troops compared with
250,000 regulars for Iran.
Nonetheless, Iran's population is.
roughly three times Iraq's. The
Iranians have used "human waves"
of young, irregular soldiers in the
war, which has claimed about 1 mil-
lion dead, wounded or captured.
An administration official said
that Iraq had been discouraged
from any attempt to destroy Iran's
economy. The officials said, for ex-
ample, that the United States had
tried last year to apply diplomatic
pressure on Iraq not to wipe out
Iran's Kharg Island oil terminal.
Several years ago, the terminal
handled 90 percent of Iran's oil;
now it moves less than 50 percent.
In his Nov. 13 speech, Reagan
said the administration opposed the
violence of the Iran-Iraq conflict.
" he slaughter on both sides has
been enormous, and the adverse
economic and political conse-
quences for that vital region of the
world have been growing," Reagan
said. "We sought to establish com-
munications with both sides in that
senseless struggle, so that we could
assist in bringing about a cease-fire
and, eventually, a settlement. We
have sought to be evenhanded by
working with both sides .... We
have consistently condemned the
violence on both sides."
Sources said that as far back as
1984, when some people feared
that Iran might overrun Iraq, the
United States began supplying Iraq
with some intelligence assistance.
Iraq reportedly used the intelli-
gence to calibrate attacks with mus-
tard gas on Iranian ground troops,
distressing U.S. officials, who con-
demn chemical warfare.
But the sources said the informa.
tion from U.S. satellites was not
supplied regularly until sometime in
early 1985. For the next 18 months
the information was supplied
through Washington channels as
needed by the Iraqis, particularly
after an Iraqi bombing raid.
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It could not be established yes-
terday in what form the Iraqis ini-
tially received the intelligence data.
Officials said it could have been ac-
tual intelligence satellite photos, or
simply selected portions, artists'
drawings done from the photos or
detailed verbal descriptions.
The direct Washington-Baghdad
link, established in August, was ac-
complished by way of a special intel-
ligence unit in the U.S. Embassy in
Baghdad, one source said. Two
sources said that the Iraqis now re-
ceive selected portions of the actual
photos that are taken by U.S. recon-
naissance satellites and on some oc-
casions, U.S. reconnaissance aircraft.
In mid-August, just after the di-
rect channel was installed, Iraq ex-
ecuted a surprise bombing raid
against the Iranian oil terminal at
Sirri Island that Iran supposedly
thought was safe from attack.
The direct link with Baghdad ap-
parently was set up shortly after
the release of the Rev. Lawrence
Martin Jenco from Lebanon and the
third U.S. shipment of arms to Iran.
Sources said that in early Octo-
ber, Casey requested a meeting
with Iraqi Foreign Minister Tariq
Aziz, who was at the United Nations
in New York. A few days later, the
sources said, Casey's request was
granted and he met Aziz and Iraq's
ambassador to the United States,
Nizar Hamdoon. Casey, who was
aware of the still-secret Iranian
arms dealings, told the two Iraqis
he wanted to make sure that they
were haopv with the flow of intel-
ligence, and he also encouraged
more attacks on economic targets
the sources said.
Later in October, the United
States sent a fourth shipment of
arms to Iran, and on Nov. 2. boe-
tage David P. Jacobsen was re-
leased. The next day, a pro-Syrian
Lebanese magazine disclosed tbg
secret U.S.-Iran initiative.
After the disclosure, Ambassador
Hamdoon requested and received
another meeting with Casey. The
two met in Washington about two
weeks ago, the sources said, and
Casey had no apology to offer for
the Iran initiative but pledged that
the secret channel for satellite data
would remain open to Iraq.
Staff researcher Barbara Fe,m,sa t
contributed to this report.
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r 17FAR3
QI\ i Nli'
WASHINGTON POST
4 December 1986
Carlucci Launched CIA Operation in 1e
A rrien That Collapsed
d
By Bob- Woodward
,Y.i~lnnghv, J.st 't of WV"("
Frank C. Carlucci, who was appointed Tues-
day as President Reagan's new national secu-
rity adviser in the midst of controversy over
White House covert operations gone awry,
once supervised one of the Central Intelligence
Agency's unpublicized failures in the Third
World, according to informed sources.
In 1979, as deputy CIA director, Carlucci
was urged by President Jimmy Carter's na-
tional security adviser, Zbigniew Brzezinski,
to set up a top secret CIA paramilitary effort
against South Yemen, a Marxist nation on the
Arabian peninsula that was threatening to
topple neighboring, pro-Western North
Yemen, the sources said.
Working with British and Saudi Arabian in-
telligence agents, Carlucci set the operation in
motion to harass South Yemen and thwart any
expansionist ambitions. But the plan ended in
disaster about a year into the Reagan admin-
istration, after Carlucci had become deputy
secretary of defense, when a CIA-trained team
of about a dozen Yemenis was captured trying
to blow up a bridge in South Yemen. Under
torture, team members betrayed their CIA
sponsors before they were executed, which
ended the operation in 1982, sources said.
The episode provided Carlucci with a first-
hand understanding of the hazards of secret
undertakings, according to sources who
worked with Carlucci at the time. Conse-
quently, the sources said, the new national
security adviser supports covert operations
but is aware of the potential for disastrous
consequences.
Carlucci had no comment vesterdav.
The South Yemen operation, according to a
number of sources familiar with it, is a case
study of CIA covert action and its relation to
the political agenda of senior White House
officials, in this instance, national security
adviser Brzezinski.
In the wake of the furor over National Se-
curity Council officials secretly selling arms
to Iran and diverting the profits to aid the
contra rebels fighting the government of Nic-
aragua, five senior sources directly involved
in the South Yemen affair said the case has a
special meaning in retrospect. As
one of the sources put it, "There
were unrealistic grand strategic
goals that thq White House thought
could be accomplished through a
covert action. And they were trying
to fix a lot of things; many, too
many, that had nothing to do with
South Yemen."
s piece
together by numerous time with negotiations over the
sources, both in and out of the gov- SALT II strategic arms limitation
ernment, the Yemenis became a treaty, "Brzezinski wanted Carlucci
U.S. national security priority on to run it .... Brzezinski structured
Feb. 23, 1979, when South Yemen it so he could get Carlucci to do it,"
made an unsuccessful three- one source said.
pronged attack against North And so Carlucci traveled over-
Yemen in an effort to seize airstrips seas to begin setting up the oper-
and roads in a bid to overthrow the ation. In an effort to maintain se.
government. Almost immediately, curity, Carlucci and his assistants
Carter notified Congress that he from the CIA directorate of oper-
would ship $390 million in planes, ations attempted to decree that the
tanks and other arms to North 30 Yemenis trained for the oper-
Yemen. ation were not to know that the
About the same time, Carter agency was behind the effort.
signed an intelligence order, known But once the training began,
as a "finding," secretly calling for a sources said the Yemenis apparent.
study of possible operations against ly were told in an effort to give the
South Yemen. Brzezinski pushed for operation credibility by reassuring
a covert mission in part because he the operatives that the United
felt the United States had been too States was supporting it.
passive in responding to Cuban ac- After the preparations, one team
tivities in 1977 and 1978 in Zaire of Yemenis was secretly sent into
and Somalia. South Yemen. But the o r
Although then-CIA Director
ended tragically with u a and
Stansfield Turner approved the op-
eration, he pronounced it "hare- confession. A second team that had
brained." But others in the agency been "inserted" into South Yemen
were more enthusiastic, and wanted for a similar paramilitary operation
to bind the CIA closer to Saudi in- was withdrawn and the operation
telligence with a joint operation. was ended.
Furthermore, as one source put it, In late March 1982, prosecutors
some senior officials in the Carter in the South Yemen capital of Aden
White House held "almost a 'comity demanded the death penalty for 13
of nations' view that our allies, par- Yemenis on trial for alleged involve-
ticularly the conservative ones that ment in a sabotage conspiracy.
distrusted and were suspicious of Eleven members of the group, the
Carter, needed a joint operation to prosecution alleged, had been
prove we would be tough." trained by the CIA in neighboring
Because Vice President Walter Saudi Arabia with the intent of pav-
F. Mondale, while a U.S. senator, ing the way for "reactionary and
had been a member of the Church imperialist military intervention" in
committee that investigated CIA South Yemen.
excesses in the 1970s, Mondale Three weeks later, the govern-
was widely viewed as anti-CIA and ment in Aden announced that all 13
Brzezinski believed "it's important members of the "gang of subver-
f
or the CIA to see Fritz Mond
l
"
a
e sio
hdld
na peaed guilty to smug.
take a stand for some sort of oarl-
military action," according to gling explosives to blow up oil in-
sources. stallations and other targets.
Mondale evidently agreed, be- Three had been sentenced to 15-
cause he not only supported the year prison terms, the government
covert operation and military ship- added, and 10 had been executed.
ments to North Yemen, but also at
one point during a White House Staff researcher Barbara Feinman.
meeting pounded the table and de- contributed to this report
clared, "We've got to get aid into
North Yemen."
Carter signed a second secret
finding, authorizing the operation.
Partly because of Turner's skepti-
cism and partly because the CIA
director was preoccupied at the
V
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WASHINGTON POST
19 November 1986
Press and broadcast reports from lr;in
CIA Curried Favor have repreatedly accused the U.S. govern-
ment of backing anti-Khomeini exile actrv-
,, . ? ? ities. Informed sources said that the Kho-
'With Khomelrii, Exiles menu regune knows many of the details of
the CIA operations because it has agents in-
Sources Say Agency Gave Regime List of KGB Agents side the Iranian exile groups.
S
Washin
ton Post Staff Writer
_
_ -
-
The Reagan administration's secret over- speculate in currency markets in_ Switzer-
tures and arms shipments to Iran are part land.
of a seven-year-long pattern of covert Cen- Administration sources said that all CIA
tral Intelligence Agency operations-some programs concerning Iran have been de-
dating back to the Carter administration- signed with several objectives: to build brid-
that were designed both to curry favor with ges to potential Iranian leaders, to use the
the regime of Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini exiles for information about what is happen-
and support Iranian exiles who seek to over- ing in Iran. to develop independent intelli-
throw it, according to informed sources. gence sources, to win friends, to drrnrrrr5h
In 1983, for example, the CIA partici- Soviet influence and to keep pressure on
pated in a secret operation to provide a list the Khomeini regime by demonstrating that
of Soviet KGB agents and collaborators op- the exile and dissident opposition is active.
erating in Iran to the Khomeini regime, Iran is strategically vital because of its nil
which then executed up to 200 suspects and supplies, warm-water ports on the Persian
closed down the communist Tudeh party in Gulf and proximity to the Soviet Unwn.
Iran, actions that dealt a major blow to KGB Iran's political turbulence and the possibil-
operations and Soviet influence there, the itv that one of the exile groups could some
sources said. Khomeini also expelled 18 day assume power justifies a U.S. strategy
Soviet diplomats, imprisoned the Tudeh that proceeds on several tracks, according
party leaders and publicly thanked God for to several administration officials, and that
"the miracle" leading to the arrests of the view is shared by some former U.S. intel-
"treasonous leaders." Iigence officers.
At the same time, secret presidential in- "I have no knowledge that the Reagan ad-
telligence orders, called "findings," author- ministration is giving money to the Iranian
ized the CIA to support Iranian exiles op- exile groups, but I see no reason not to give
posed to the Khomeini regime, the sources them money and at the same time extend a
said. These included providing nearly $6 hand to Khomeini," Stansfield Turner, CIA
million to the main Iranian exile movement, director in the Carter administration, said
financing an anti-Khomeini exile group radio Monday. "Playing both sides of the fence is
station in Egypt and supplying a miniatur. not unusual, as long as they did not fund any
ized television transmitter for an 11-minute exile group to the extent that they would
clandestine broadcast to Iran two months try to overthrow the (Khomeini) govern-
ago by Reza Pahlavi, the son of the late ment. There is not a prayer that they could
Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi, who vowed, do that."
"I will return." But one well-placed administration
One well-placed intelligence source said source said the CIA operations involving
that this support of the anti-Khomeini exile Iran were ad hoc and inconsistent, rather
movement is "just one level above [intelli. than being the result of a coherent U.S.
gence] collection," and that the money in. strategy. "The U.S. does not have a policy
volved was equivalent to the "walking- but a series of actions," said the source, who
around money" frequently distributed in described the administration as "groping in
American political campaigns. Administra- a maze" on the Iran issue.
tion officials stressed that the CIA opera- Despite the CIA efforts to curry favor
tions are not intended to bring about Kho- with the Khomeini regime, Iran continued
meini's downfall but are aimed primarily at to encourage violence against American in.
obtaining intelligence about his regime terests, sources noted. For example, intel-
through the exile groups. ligence shows that Iran directly supported
The White Ifouse and administration the October 1983 bombing of the Marine
spokesmen declined to comment on these Corps barracks in Beirut in which 241 U.S.
CIA operations. Vice Adm. John M. Poin- servicemen were killed. This was less than
dexter, the president's national security af- a year after the CIA received a list of KGB
fairs adviser, told a television interviewer agents in Iran from a Soviet defector and
Sunday that "1 don't want to confirm or gave the names to the Khomeini regime.
deny any other operations" and added that Sources said that the British intelligence
we aren't' seeking the overthrow of the service also participated in the operation
Khomeini regime." that revealed the Soviet agents in Iran.
ome of the Iranian exiles in Paris said it
is well-known within their groups that they
B
y Bob Woodward have received CIA money. Sources also said
g
11~-
.
. _
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Administration othcials said that more
recent overtures made under President
Reagan to "moderates" in Tehran have
~tnpped Iranian government sponsorship of
terrorist actions against Americans.
In January 1981, when Reagan took of-
fice and 52 Americans returned after 444
days' captivity in Tehran, the CIA had al-
ready begun under President Carter a num-
ber of anti-Khomeini operations. One was
designed to gather intelligence about Iran
and support Iranian exiles, sources said;
another was a more ambitious plan that one
senior source said was designed to inflict
"punishment" on the Khomeini regime,
which was holding the U.S. hostages.
Under Reagan and his CIA director, Wil-
liam J. Casey, the first major Iranian oper-
ation was intended to support an exile
group headed by the shah's former naval
commander-in-chief, Rear Adm. Ahmad
Madam The Madani group received several
million dollars, but proved too independent
by insisting on control of their own anti-
Khomeini operations, and the CIA connec.
tions were soon dissolved.
In 1982, the CIA began supporting the
main Iranian exile movement, the Paris-
based Front for the Liberation of Iran (FLI).
Headed by former prime minister Ali Amini,
the FLI advocates Khomeini's ouster and
since 1983 has called for restoration of the
Iranian monarchy.
The CIA has given the FLI $100,000 a
month. But beginning about two years ago,
two members of the National Security
Council staff. Lt. Col. Oliver North Jr. and
Vincent M. Canistraro, became involved in
supervising the CIA operation after hearing
allegations that the FLI was mismanaged
and ineffective.
The allegations included charges that
some FLI members were providing useless
and questionable information to the CIA and
that CIA funds were being used to speculate
in currency markets in Switzerland. Con-
sequently, the FLI member functioning as
liaison with the CIA was ousted in 1985. His
successor, however, was discovered to be a
former communist who advocated hostage-
taking and who was a suspected Khomeini
informer, according to U.S. and Iranian
sources.
That liaison was removed earlier this
year, and the CIA appointed one of the
shah's former cabinet officers as the new
overseer of the FLI money, the sources
said.
Neither the CIA nor the White House
ever seriously believed that exile groups
were strong enough to overthrow Kho-
meini, sources said, and none of the current
operations includes paramilitary support.
As part of the FLI support, the CIA also
provides equipment and $20,000 to
$30,000 a month for the organization's Ra-
dio Newt, ol- Radio Liberation, which broad-
t acts anti-Khomeini programs for four
hours a day from Egypt to Iran, according
to U.S. and Iranian sources.
As the links to the exile groups were being
built, the CIA received an unexpected wind-
fall of intelligence information in Iran through
the defection of Vladimir Kuzichkin, a senior
KGB officer in Tehran whose job it had been
to maintain contacts with the Tudeh party.
Kuzichkin defected to the British in late 1982
and was debriefed later by the CIA, giving
the United States details of Soviet and Tudeh
operations in Iran.
The CIA then provided Khomeini with
lists and supporting details of at least 100
and perhaps as many as 200 Soviet agents
in Iran, sources said. After arresting and
executing most of the alleged agents, Kho-
meini outlawed the Tudeh party on May 4,
1983, and expelled the 18 Soviet diplomats
believed to be involved in KGB operations.
Many Tudeh members were arrested, in-
cluding the party's secretary general and
six central committee members, and they
were forced to make televised confessions
that they spied for Moscow.
One well-placed source said the CIA ac-
tion was intended to cripple KGB operations
in Iran while offering "a gesture of good
will" to Khomeini.
There were reports at the time of an up-
heaval in the Tudeh party, but it was not
known that the CIA had a role. The role of
Kuzichkin also passed largely unnoticed ex-
cept for a 1985 column by Jack Anderson
and Dale Van Atta reporting that the de-
fector had brought with him two trunks full
of documents about the KGB and the Iran-
ian communist party. The column reported
that the British "secretly turned the infor-
mation over to Khomeini."
A CIA memo of May 17, 1985, saying
that the United States was lagging behind
the Soviets in cultivating Iranian contacts
for a post-Khomeini era, was apparently one
of the first actions that led to Reagan's de-
cision to begin secret overtures to the Iran-
ians and eventually to ship them arms this
year.
A recent CIA-supported operation was
the sudden appearance on Iranian television
two months ago of Reza Pahlavi, son of the
late shah. That clandestine anti-Khomeini
broadcast was made possible by the CIA,
which provided technical assistance and a
miniaturized suitcase transmitter, the
sources said. The broadcast disrupted two
channels of Iranian television for 11
minutes at 9 p.m. on Sept. 5. It is not known
whether the shah's son knew that the CIA
had provided support for the broadcast.
The Khomeini regime apparently was
aware of or suspected a U.S. role in the
clandestine appearance and responded with
a radio broadcast of its own, declaring that
"the terrorist government of Reagan ... in
a disgraceful manner was the vanguard of
this puppet show."
Staff researchers Barbara Feinman and
Ferman Patterson contributed to this report.
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APAStfD
W1 PAGLAI
State Dept.
Plan Urged
Libya Coup
Reagan Policy Vetoed
Efforts to Encourage
Gadhafi Assassination
By Bob Woodward
wadeineme PflN staff writer
STAT
STAT
A State Department working pa-
per used last August in drawing up
the Reagan administration's plan of
deception and disinformation
against Libyan leader Moammar
Gadhafi advocated a strategy that
could lead to "a coup or assassina.
tion attempt" against Gadhafi by his
own military or other opponents.
The memo, circulated by the
State Department on Aug. 6 in ad-
vance of a White House meeting of
officials at the assistant secretary
level, stated, "The goal of our near-
term strategy should be to continue
Gadhafi's paranoia so that he re-
mains preoccupied, off-balance ...
[and] believes that the army and
other elements in Libya are plotting
against him-possibly with Soviet
help. Believing that, he may in-
crease the pressure on the [Libyan]
army, which in turn may prompt a
coup or assassination attempt."
The final directive approved by
President Reagan in mid-August did
not mention assassination. Instead,
it ordered covert, diplomatic and
economic steps designed to deter
Libyan-sponsored terrorism and
bring about a change of leadership
in Libya.
Administration officials have said
explicitly that the overall adminis.
tration policy does not directly seek
assassination of Gadhafi, although
some officials acknowledge that
that could be one outcome. A 1981
executive order signed by Reagan
directs that "no person employed by
or acting on behalf of the united
States government shall engage in,
or conspire to engage in, assassi-
nation "
An administration official yester-
day issued the following White
House response: "The document in
question is a working paper with no
standing as administration policy.
Moreover, any inference in the doc-
ument that a policy option was ever
considered to promote the assas-
sination of Gadhafi is wrong. Sup-
port for assassination in any form
has never been and is not now a
part of administration policy."
The statement added, "Advocat-
ing change in a governmental re-
gime is not the same as advocating
assassination. To associate the two
Several senior administration
officials privately criticized the am-
biguity of overall policy toward
Gadhafi, which they see as aimed at
removing him without directly em-
ploying necessary or likely means
for doing so. "They want him out
but not the dirty hands," said one
ranking administration official.
Similarly, some sources said ad-
ministration officials failed to real-
ize that spreading disinformation to
deceive Gadhafi would also mislead
the American news media and pub-
lic. They also said that the policy of
deception and disinformation grew
out of an overreaction by adminis-
tration officials to a new intelli-
gence report on Gadhafi's state of
mind.
.Th jn a .g ncP port deliv
ered in July to Secretary of State
eor e P. SEE an Central Intel.
li ence enc erector t ism .
Casey, sat a a t a ace so
bizarrely in a meeting with y6men,
out of control and might be on the
verge of a nervous breakdo ....
Some administration officals saw in
this an opportunity to increase psy-
chological pressure on Gadhafi,
whom they were determined to
oust if they could.
Subsequent, more reliable intel-
ligence indicated that the initial re-
port was exaggerated. Gadhafi ac-
tually sat through the meeting with
the Yemenis in silence, apparently
sulking in a corner, according to
sources. Such behavior is not un-
usual for the mercurial Libyan lead-
er, according to government spe-
cialists, but by the time the Gadhafi
behavior was understood, a crucial
interagency review was under way.
Keenly attentive to Gadhafi's ev-
ery step, fearing a resurgence of his
terrorist plots and wishing to cap-
italize on the deterrent value of the
April 14 U.S. bombing raid on Lib-
ya, the administration seized on the
original report of the Libyan's in-
stability and went into high gear.
The State and Defense de rt-
ments. t e an t Fe White
House began to consid r wh r s tens
might be taken to keen uo he ores-
sure on Gadhafi and jar him psycho-
to icall as part of another phase of
the year one a i'ort to ~_t,~ ,n
de_rmme his reg,me
Althou h there was other evi-_
dence that adha i wa in a de
es-
sion ater the U S r id sources eg
the administration's tendency to
jump t0 conclusions from t__tatjve
or single intelligent re its as_in-
dicative of the handlin of Libyan
ence t e
..It a no longer rational," said one
intelligence official. "The use and
sifting of [intelligence reports does
not have the clear-headed, dispas-
sionate eye that is required.-
': bl!Casey for one wanted more
action and more results, according
to sources.
Richard Kerr the CIA's new de
-31 . uty =07tor for ?gnneanal
ysis, and Thomas Tweeten, the sen-
ior opera tons o tcta or a ar
ast an sta, went to work, ac-
cor mg to sources. sca ation o
the psychological war a ainst Gad-
hafrw ro vac u. he 17th anniversary of Gad-
hafi's revolution was coming up on
Sept. I. He was supposed to make a
speech to mark the occasion, an im-
portant symbolic event. U.S. offi-
cials speculated on the possibility of
frightening him into not appearing.
There was reliable intelligence that
he had moved Libyan military head-
quarters from the coast inland near-
l, 500 miles to Kufrah. He was ob-
viously fearful, officials concluded,
and wanted the headquarters to be
less accessible to U.S. carrier-based
bombers.
Inside the inteDin nee
mu-Com
nit and within the State Depart-
mnt ana the Mute Heee~e
bate began. Could Gadhafi be
cause o ose con i ence in se a cou d be kept in
on the Libyan mlh arm that is
supposed to bt restive and unhappy
wit t etr ea er.
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The officials involved in these
discussions new t at a
an of er top of icials were
t_ tat t to A effo to -
mine and overthrow adhafi ha ! .
not succeeded "We had a policy
that was working w .~o-nr
terrorism, but senior admi
ti n o icials wanted to o further
and change the regime " said one
source.
A seven- a e memo dated Aug. 6
from t e State oar m nt'~ nffire
of intelligence and research was
distributed to senior middlp.I j
officials in preparation for an up-
coming interagency meetin . It was
and l
illusory events" and s t e rea
speculated
that enough Pec
pressure might prompt h m to so pre ss hhis
own military and other Libyan el-
ements that they could attempt to
assassinate him.
One recipient of the memo was
Lt. Gen. John H. Moellering, assist-
ant to the chairman of the joints
Chiefs of Staff, according to
sources. They said that Moellering
expressed dismay within the Pen-
tagon and to Adm. William J. Crowe
Jr., chairman of the Joint Chiefs,
that the administration might be
embarking on a dangerous course.
He argued that such a plan could be
the equivalent of waving a red flag
in front of the unstable Libyan lead-
er.
He and others also expressed
concern that U.S. officials were dis-
cussing actions designed to prompt
an "assassination" despite what they
took to be a ban on U.S. govern.
ment participation in such plots.
On Aup. 7 at 4:30 p .T., the Crisis.
Pre-Planning_ rou CPPG1_met at
the White House situation room.
There sentor representatives -from
the State Depart nme t and
White te House endorsed the overall
plan out to in tats part
ment memo and other planning doc
uments.
Vincent M. Cannistraro a vet-
eran CIA operations officer and di-
rector of intelligence on the Nation-
al Security Council staff, and How-
ard Teicher, the director of the
office of political military affairs in
the NSC, supported the disinforma-
tion and deception p n. t so`urcQs
said.
Informed sources said that they
understood that White House na-
tional security affairs adviser John
M. Poindexter approved the gen-
eral principles and approaches of
the State Department memo, but
the reference to prompting an "as-
sassination attempt" was removed.
A meeting with the president to
consider the next steps on Libya
was scheduled for Aug. 14. This
was the National Security Planning
Group (NSPG), th. Cabinet-level
discussion involving Reagan and his
top advisers.
Before the meeting, Poindexter
sent the president a three-page
memo outlining the next steps and
saying that a key element of the
strategy was to combine "real and
,illusionary events-through a dis-
information program-with the ba-
sic goal of making Gadhafi think
that there is a high degree of inter-
nal opposition to him within Libya,
that his key trusted aides are dis-
loyal, that the U.S. is about to move
against him militarily."
This section of Poindexter's
memo reflected the Aug. 6 State
Department proposal for "a se-
quenced chain of real and illusory
events .... "
Sources said Reagan approved
the overall plan and that it was
made formal in a National Security
Decision Document he signed, That
document does not mention assas-
sination, and the only deception was
to be directed abroad and at Gad-
hafi.
Poindexter's aide Teicher was,
according to sources, the only non-
Cabinet-level official at the Aug. 14
NSPG meeting. He was the note-
taker for the one-hour session.
White House officials said that
Teicher was one of the officials who
spoke with The Wall Street Journal
before its Aug. 25 story that said
"the U.S. and Libya are on a colli-
sion course again," and painted a
picture of impending U.S. military
action in response to Gadhafi's al-
leged renewal of terrorist plots.
Teicher has said he spoke with
one author of the Journal story be-
fore its publication but that he did
not leak anything and the author
already had all the details.
The White House has taken the
position that the Journal article was
"generally correct" but that the in-
formation was not authorized for
release. One White House official
said recently that information pro-
vided the Journal was part of a
"Lone Ranger operation" by one or
more officials but not Teicher.
After The Washington Post dis-
closed details of the administra.
tion's deception campaign against
Gadhafi last week, administration
officials disputed the suggestion-
contained in Poindexter's August
memo to Reagan-that Gadhafi
was "quiescent" on the terrorist front at the
time the campaign against him was being
planned.
The most recent administration position
on whether Gadhafi was stepping up terror-
ist plans last summer was provided Thurs-
day by a senior administration official who
said that in July the intelligence was tenta-
tive-"it didn't say that he [Gadhafil was
-going to go off and bomb something or go
off and take somebody hostage or hijack an
airplane. It wasn't that kind of hard intel-
ligence, but there were little pieces that
indicated he was beginning to move."
Intelligence experts said the U.S. intel-
ligence agencies and the White House were
on the lookout for anything on Gadhafi. Said
one well-placed expert, "The intelligence
machinery was cocked, a hair-trigger ....
Five Libyans arriving in Paris with five suit-
cases became an intelligence report.
"It just wasn't hard," said this expert,
who has firsthand knowledge of the reports.
"Poindexter would not have said 'quiescent'
to the president if that was not the case
.... At the same time there was indication
that the Libyan infrastructure was being
reassembled" after so many Libyan diplo-
mats allegedly involved in terrorism were
expelled from European capitals.
He added, "The administration and the
intelligence agencies are paranoid about
Gadhafi and for good reason."
He said some members of the adminis-
tration are not skilled at interpreting raw
intelligence, saying it is an art form a
d
h
n
t
at
many officials are inclined to overstate the
Libyan problem.
At the same time, sources said the ad-
ministration had dozens of reports showi
ng
meetings and travel by Libyans that were
deemed suspicious.
A senior administration official said the
increase number ofintelligence reports
hinting at terronst active ym ar r cis a
_ _ _
vastly improved intelligence collec_tion sys-
t rt and the high priority assigned to re-
ports of ossible terrorist incidents, espe-
cia y involving i ya, a known and
proven
STAT
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He said, there are "lots of 'heads up' re-
ports and that does not necessarily mean
there is renewed activity .... We are just
better and more attentive .... Also, our
ability to disseminate it is better."
One former head of a U.S. intelligence
agenc sai it is his understanding that the
intelligence on Libya and yan ac i
not of a very high quality and attributes the
disagreements to the weakness of the in-
formation. He added, "When the inte i-
gence is o an incontroverti e, t ere is
agreement. You get disagreements w en no
one has enou h good information."
Reagan and other a ministration officials
on Thursday denied any intent to have the
disinformation appear in the U.S. news me-
dia. At the same time, they acknowledged
that there was a plan to deceive Gadhafi.
Whether the White House deliberately
attempted to spread disinformation, or
whether one aide without authorization
passed on the disinformation to U.S. news
media, officials said that a simple fact was
overlooked: It is impossible to have a high-
level, high-visibility effort of deception
aimed abroad without some or all of the in-
formation appearing in the U.S. media.
A former CIA officer said that the agency
normally undertakes small, low-level disin-
formation campaigns in a few countries or a
sin a country. But in N e current anti-Gad-
ha i plan, the former officer said, "the ire of
disinformation was supposed to sweep
across the Middle East and Europe ... and
no one was supposed to notice? They were
kidding themselves."
The recirculation back into the U.S. news
media of disinformation planted abroad by
the UTA is often referred-to as " ow back."
But one source familiar with tthieuntinis-
tration strategy said that what happened in
the latest a a i ploy was owT-front" be-
cause the launch of the idea, intentions or
not, was in the U.S. media.
Staff researcher Barbara Feinman
contributed to this report.
HOW PROGRAM ON LIBYA DEVELOPED
^ April 14: U.S. bombing raid on Libya.
^ July: New intelligence report questioning the mental stability of
Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi triggers interagency review of
U.S.-Libyan policy.
^ Aug. 6: State Department group circulates to interagency group
a memo proposing a disinformation and deception campaign and
suggesting such a campaign could trigger an assassination attempt
on Gadhafi by his military or other opponents.
^ Aug, 7: Crisis Pre-Planning Group of officials from State, Central
Intelligence Agency, Defense Department and White House meet
at White House to endorse overall plan outlined in original State
Department memo.
^ Aug. 12: Reagan gets three-page memo from Adm. John M.
Poindexter, his national security affairs adviser, summarizing a pro-
posed program of disinformation against Libya.
^ Aug. 14: Reagan meets with Cabinet-level National Security
Planning Group and approves the, program as outlined by Poindex-
ter.
^ Aug. 25: The Wall Street Journal reports that the United States
and Libya are on a "collision course" and that U.S. military action
against'Libya is impending.
^ Aug. 26: White House spokesman Larry Speakes describes the
Journal report as "authoritative" and major television networks and
newspapers report stories similar to the Journal account.
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IV/ Mr, L F A
40 PAG
WASHINGTON POST
2 October 1986
Gadhafi Target of Secret U.S. Deception Plan
Elaborate Campaign Included Disinformation That Appeared as Fact in American Media
By Bob Woodward
Washington Post StAff Writer
In August the Reagan administration launched
a secret and unusual campaign of deception de-
signed to convince Libyan leader Moammar Gad-
hafi that he was about to be attacked again by
U.S. bombers and perhaps be ousted in a coup,
according to informed sources and documents.
The secret plan, adopted at a White House
meeting on Aug. 14, was outlined in a three-page
memo that John M. Poindexter, the president's
national security affairs adviser, sent to Presi-
dent Reagan.
"One of the key elements" of the new strategy,
the Poindexter memo said, "is that it combines
real and illusionary events-through a disinfor-
mation program-with the basic goal of making
Gadhafi think [word underlined in the original]
that there is a high degree of internal opposition
to him within Libya. that his key trusted aides
are disloyal, that the U.S. is about to move
against him militarily."
It was an elaborate plan: "a series of closely
coordinated events involving covert, diplomatic,
military and public actions," according to Poin-
dexter's memo. Military officers expressed some
reservations about the plan, and intelligence spe-
cialists were deeply divided about its potential
efficacy. The plan was the latest phase of the
administration's policy, first adopted last year, to
try to topple Gadhafi, a known instigator of ter-
rorist acts targeted by the administration as a
threat that has to be removed.
Beginning with an Aug. 25 report in The Wall
Street Journal, the American news media-in-
cluding The Washington Post-reported as fact
much of the false information generated by the
new plan. Published articles described renewed
Libyan backing for terrorism and a looming, new
tr.S.-Libya confrontation. But U.S. intelligence.
officials had actually concluded in August that
Gadhafi was "quiescent" on the terrorist front,
according to the Poindexter memo. The only
"confrontation" was the one generated by the
administration plan, according to sources and
administration planning papers.
During September, however, U.S. intelligence
agencies
assem a evi ence a i ya Fad
begun lannin a si scant num r o erronst
attacks and some senior s are concern
that this is in part a response tot a mis
lion's latest campaign against Gadhafi f great-
est concern to U.S. officials are reports consid.
ered reliable but still inconclusive that Libya had
a direct hand in the Sept. 5 attack on Pan Amer-
ican World Airways Flight 073 at the Karachi
airport in Pakistan and provided logistical sup-
port for the terrorists, according to informed sources.
When the administration's secret deception plan was
launched in August, officials acknowledged in internal
memos that it might provoke Gadhafi into new terrorist
acts. But senior officials decided that the potential ben.
efits of the operation outweighed this risk.
The objective of the plan was to keep Gadhafi "pre-
occupied" and "off balance" and to portray him as "para-
noid and ineffective" so that, as the memo put it, "forces
within Libya which desire his overthrow will be embold-
ened to take action."
Press Told of New Intelligence on Terrorism
Poindexter's three-page memo to Reagan outlining
plan was drafted in preparation for a National Se.
curity Planning Group (NSPG) meeting convened to
consider the next steps the administration would take
against Gadhafi. The NSPG is the key Cabinet-level
forum in which Reagan and his top aides discuss and
make decisions on the most sensitive foreign policy
matters.
The president, Poindexter and nine other key offi-
cials met at the White House to discuss this plan at 11
a.m. Thursday, Aug. 14. Sources said the basic plan
was approved and codified in general terms in a formal
presidential decision document. Details of the plan were
left to Poindexter, the State Department and the Cen-
tral Intelligence Agency.
Soon after the meeting administration officials told
reporters that the United States had new intelligence
indicating that Gadhafi was again stepping up his ter-
rorist plans, following a four-month lull after the April
14 American bombing raid against Libya.
But Poindexter's memo to Reagan just before the
h h4 meeting painted a less alarmin picture "Al-
13 UIdC Vaunan is Lem rani quiescent in his SLL ft o
terrorism, he may soon move to a more acre. t
Qther sources confirmed that there was no signifi-
cant, reliable intelligence in mid- u ust to su est tiiat
s
But the State De 13
men and the CIA co. ncluded
that it might be an opportune moment to execute the
cou race against e f van 1111 er,
A White House planning docurii t sent to CIA Di
rector William J. Casey before the A tg f dram
sai : 'a a i s aura of invincibility has been shattered.
his prestige is badly tarnished and his grip on power
seems precarious.
administration analysts evidently of were
two
minds. The Poindexter memo to Rea an written at the
same time sai : oat into ence estimates conic u e
that in spite o new tensions an a f s own s oc ,
de rose of n an fm ire ormance o owin t e Aqie p
ri1 14 raf , he is Still y in contro in Via.
WWI
STAT
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Mining Libyan Harbors Weighed, Rejected Contingency Plans Were Months Old
Senior administration officials have been frustrated The Journal wrote: "The Reagan administration is
that G-adhali has been able to remain in wer le-spite a preparing to teach the mercurial Libyan leader another
presidentially authorized, Year-long CIA effort to oust lesson. Right now, the Pentagon is completing plans for
him. a new and larger bombing of Libya in case the president
Over the summer, the administration considered but orders it." In fact, the administration only had contin-
rejec mining the harbors of Libya, sources gency plans for new military action that were several
anti4jadhafi forces that the _A had been suooorti ng months old, and nothing new was being done, sources
proved weak and disorganized, the sources said. All of said.
the efforts against adhafi were apparently thwarted The Journal report said that the administration was
bj.h* personal Security and a network of inform- considering action through the African country of Chad
ers in ibya and among Libyan exiles. to put pressure on Gadhafi, who has annexed a portion
Officials acknowledged in their internal discussions of Chad with about 6,000 Libyan troops.
I that the deception plan was risky. "Gadhafi may lash out According to the journal, "The deputy commander in
against Americans and regional friends with terror and chief of the U.S. European Command, Gen. Richard
subversion," said the White House memo sent to Casey. Lawson, quietly visited the poverty-stricken desert na-
But the administration concluded that potential benefits tion [of Chad] earlier this month to see whether [Chad]
outweighed any dangers. "There are risks," that memo President [Hissenej Habre, with U.S. and French help,
said. "However, the benefits of a successful policy de- might be able to expel the Libyans."
mand that every appropriate effort be made to achieve In August, a State Department planning paper on the
our objectives." deception plan said: "Lawson's trip to Chad later this
Senior officials said Reagan Casey and Secrets of month provides an opportunity for disinformation to
State George Shultz are particularly determined to reach Gadhafi that the U.S. and France are developing
remove Wanati. As oin exte32-1d r in h t contingency plans for a 'Chad Option.'
memo, the purpose of taking additional steps against Lawson visited Chad on Aug. 12 and 13, but State
Libya was to deter terrorism, moderate Libyan policies Department officials said recently that the United
and "bring about a change of leadership in Libya .... " . States never formally had discussions with France
The administration has concluded that, as the Poin- about joint action against the Libyan forces there.
dexter memo said, "any alternative leadership to Gad- France has tacitly accepted the partition of Chad.
hafi would be better for U.S. interests and international The Chad aspect of the deception plan apparently
order." I grew out of a National Security Council memo dated
The mid-August plan approved by Reagan did not Aug. 7, proposing that the United States attempt to
specifically call for the planting of false stories in the "shame France into asserting itself" in Chad, a former
U.S. media. A State Department planning memo, how- French colony. The document suggested communicat.
ever, did provide that "U.S. government backgrounds ing through "military-to-military channels and not
media on 1) three-ring circus in Libya with infighting through the political channels which failed earlier this
among groups jockeying for post-Gadhafi era, 2) threat year .... Given the stated desire of some [French]
of resurgent terrorism .... " general officers to cooperate with us against Gadhafi,
The secret plan also called for "foreign media place- we might actively encourage them to sell the proposal
menu + v t e to their civilian leadership."
When a report appeared on the front page of The After the Journal and other news reports appeared
Wall Street Journal on Aug. 25 stating without quali- describing the purported U.S. proposal to take joint.
fication that "The U.S. and Libya are on a collision action in Chad, sources said, the French voiced concern
course again," it was embraced publicly by Poindexter to the State Department. Instead of frightening Gad-
and White House spokesman Larry Speakes, who called hafi, sources said, the disinformation scuttled possible
the article "authoritative." On the basis of those en- cooperation with the French on Chad in the near future.
dorsements, other news organizations, including The
Post, carried reports summarizing the information that 'Overburden and Spook Libyan Defenses'
initially appeared in the Journal. In subsequent days The August plan had a high-visibility military coin.
administration officials both affirmed and denied that ponent. The White House memo to Casey said: "Overt-
there was new evidence of Libyan-backed terrorism, or DOD [Department of Defense] operations will also be
that a new confrontation was in the offing. required to give credibility to rumors that the U.S. in.
Yesterday, in response to a question to the White tends to take further military action." The memo said
House about stories published in August on Libya, one there would be "unilateral and joint exercises designed
official said: "The media deceived itself and the stories to deceive, overburden and 'spook' Libyan defenses."
were hyped. There was no intent that the administra- U.S. and Egyptian forces conducted military exer.
tion's actions in military exercises and so forth become cises, called "Seawind," in the region in August. Sources
public." said that the exercises were carried out in a particularly
The Journal's Aug. 25 story reported as fact various provocative manner, sending aircraft into the Tripoli
administration plans that were actually part of the de- Flight Information Region so they would appear on Lib-
ception plan described in the August memos. The re- yan radar, though the most provocative action, crossing
port did not mention deception, the key ingredient in Gadhafi's self-proclaimed "line of death" into the Gulf of
the plan. Sidra, was not undertaken.
The paper quoted "a senior U.S. official" as saying of "There's a fine line between harassment and prov-
Gadhafi: "There are increasing signs that he's resumed ocation," said one source who considered the August
planning and preparations fo
initiatives
ote
t
ti
i
ll
"
p
r
error
n
a
st acts.
y dangerous.
According
to the Poindexter memo to Reagan, there were no such
signs.
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The administration plan specified that two U.S. dip- . Taraki and the four hijackers are in Pakistani custody
lomatic missions be given an anti-Libyan spin. One was, and are undergoing interrogation. Sources said that
a visit to European capitals by Vernon A. Walters, the Pakistan is supplying the United States with some in-
U.S. ambassador to the United Nations; the other a vis- formation.
it by Assistant Secretary of Defense Richard L. Armi- Reagan has publicly promised to take military action
tage last month to Libyan neighbors Algeria and Tunic again against Libya, as he did in the April 14 raid, if that
sia. Walters' mission, which followed the publication of country is directly connected to other terrorist acts
the journal report and Speakes' description of it as "au- against U.S. installations or targets. The week after the
thoritative," was billed as a briefing on the new U.S. ev- raid, Reagan said, "If their government continues its
idence of Libyan sponsorship of terrorist acts. In fact, campaign of terror against Americans, we will act
European sources told Washington Post correspondents again."
in London and Bonn, Walters offered no such evidence At the Aug. 14 meeting of Reagan and his top nation-
to the Western allies. al security affairs advisers, Adm. William J. Crowe Jr.,
The Armitage trip, according to a planning memo, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, voiced concern
would provide a "similar opportunity for disinforma- about the plan, according to sources, questioning
tion." whether it was an appropriate use of military resources.
Other portions of the plan included attempts to make He said that there was great danger in saying or imply-
it appear that the United States was flying across the ing that the United States was going to take dramatic
"line of death"
aspect o using hddeceptive
plan involved deceptive air- steps, then failing to follow through. Crowe argued that
nscraft. Another
carrier operations to mislead Libya about the in- this would lessen the deterrent value of the April 14
raid and any other ongoing efforts to deter Gadhafi.
tent of U.S. forces to operate near its territory. Though a variety of reservations was voiced during
The CIA undertook placements of false information the hour-long meeting, sources said that the strong
in theforei media. Other covert techniques involving anti-Gadhafi sentiment in the administration overrode
communications, U.S. aircraft and submarines were other considerations.
planned. At one point, according to a source, Reagan made a
One planning document said that the false informa- joke about the Libyan leader's well-known oclivit
tion should include articles showing that the Soviet wearing ostentatious and colorful clothing The pres.
Union was planning a coup in Libya. It said, "Libyan in- ident quipped, "Why not invite Gadhafi to San Francis-
telligence should be provided photography of Libyan co, he likes to dress up so much."
dissidents meeting with Soviet officials in Paris, Bagh- Shultz rejoined: "Why don't we give him AIDS!"
dad, etc" Others at the table laughed.
The U.S. intelligence community has been sharply di-
vided over the new tactics against Gadhafi, according to Staff researcher Barbara Feinman contnbattd to this
informed sources. Some Libyan experts in the CIA are
concern t at the administration's Psychological war-
are against a i will backfire, or already has. In this
view, a . p n is only tee ing a a W s desire to
be at the center of events, and has likely fueled his ter-
rorist schemes and plans to extend his rule in North Af-
rica beyond Libyan borers.
Adm. Crowe Voices Concern About Plan
The possibility that Libya did promote the Sept. 5 hi-
jacking of the Pan Am jetliner in Karachi is cited by
some specialists who fear the consequences of the U.S.
deception plan, though there is no evidence that U.S.
actions triggered the hijacking, which is the sort of ter-
rorist act that Gadhafi has organized in the past.
Sources stressed that U.S. intelligence agencies do
not yet have conclusive proof of Libyan involvement in
the Karachi hijacking, but said there are ominous signs
of such complicity. Salman Taraki, an Arab with a Lib-
yan passport, was arrested in Pakistan five days after
the hijacking, and an intelligence report said that he had
claimed he was on a "special mission" for an operative of
the Libyan intelligence service. Taraki apparently was
stranded by accident in Pakistan and unable, as planned,
to leave the country before or after the hijacking that
left 21 persons dead, the sources said.
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1 t STAT
ARTICLE
ON PAGE
NEW YORK TIMES
3 October 1986
Administration Is Accused
OfDeceiving Press on Libya
By LESLIE H. GELB
This was the first of at least three
Special to The New York Timea
WASHINGTON, Oct. 2 - The Rea-
gan Administration faced a growing
controversy today over reports that it
had made selective disclosures of news
and "disinformation" about Libya and
its leader, Col. Muammar el-Qaddafi.
The issue arose after a report by Bob
Woodward in The Washington Post to-
day that the Reagan Administration
had devised a policy that included leak-
ing to the press false information de-
signed to convince Colonel Qaddafi that
his country was about to be attacked by
the United States or that he was about
to be overthrown in a coup.
In a new development, Administra-
tion officials said today that the "disin-
formation" program did not originate
with a memo written by Adm. John M.
Poindexter, President Reagan's na-
tional security adviser, as The Post's
account said. They said the campaign
grew out of a mid-August State Depart-
ment document to the White House lay-
ing out a "deception" campaign. That
document represented a consensus of a
series of interdepartmental meetings,
the officials said.
Erroneous News Reported
The Post also said The Wall Street
Journal, The Post itself and other
newspapers had carried erroneous
news reports "generated by the new
plan."
Today the White House denied it had
tried to plant false news reports, but a
spokesman confirmed that the Admin-
istration had a policy designed to har-
ass and ultimately remove Colonel
Qaddafi.
In a meeting with columnists today,
Mr. Reagan "challenged the veracity"
of The Post's report. But he also ac-
knowledged that there were. "memos
back and forth" on the subject of deal-
ing with Libya. The President also
denied that the Administration had any
% )ke terrorists att.tcks
'iy L. , t.
August Memo Described
As recounted by officials today, the
August memo called for a "disinforma-
tion" or "deception" campaign to
bring attention to Colonel Qaddafi's
continuing terrorist activities, to exag-
gerate his vulnerability to internal op-
position and to play up the possibility of
new American military action against
him, according to Administration offi-
cials.
key memorandums from several dif-
ferent agencies that officials said
recommended a disinformation plan,
yet failed to specify how it would be
carried out.
But a range of officials insisted today
that in the meetings held to discuss
thel;e documents, the participants
spoee of passing on exaggerated infor-
nia only in the foreign press. Even
re rding the foreign press, the oW
cia said, neither the memorandums
no discussions provided any guide-
Un on whom to contact or what ex-
ac to say.
on*r more of their colleagues took it
updt themselves to give what they
kn to be inaccurate information to
the American press as well.
#$ these news reports appeared, the
Whjre House spokesman, Larry
S es, "generally" confirmed them,
boa on what he said today was the
advice of Admiral Poindexter.
moral Poindexter endorsed the
m randum written by the State De-
pa ment after an interdepartmental
m ting of a body called the Pre-Crisis
Pt ing Group, the officials said. He
the& had his staff rewrite it in three
pa for Mr. Reagan before a Na-
po i Security Planning Group meet-
in This is an informal Cabinet-level
g p over which Mr. Reagan presided
on tug. 14.
A Trail of Documents
is Poindexter memo thus became
then.second document in the trail of
dooopments dealing with the subject of
"diinformation" as a means of shak-
inavthe Qaddafi Government
rtly thereafter, the Poindexter
mdtwrandum was once again rewrit-
tedtas Presidential directive and
signed by Mr. Reagan. This was the
third and final document on the sub-
ject, according to officials familiar
with the memos.
The goals as set forth in this direc-
tive were in keeping with the long-
standing policy of increasing Colonel
Qaddafi's "anxiety" about his internal
strength and American military
power, deterring him from undertak-
ing new acts of terrorism and ulti-
mately toppling him from power.
The principal means outlined in the
directive was the disinformation or de-
ception campaign.
"We just didn't focus on the issue in
the memos," said an official familiar
with them, "but just lying to the Amer-
ican press is something we would
never do."
'On a Collision Course'
Nonetheless, on Aug. 25, The Wall
Street Journal published an article
beginnin& "The U.S. and Libya are on
a collision course again."
The day the article appeared, a sen-
ior White House official with the Presi-
dent in California generally confirmed
it. But officials of the Pentagon, State
Department, Central Intelligence
Agency and even the White House in
Washington said on that day that the
Journal article was an exagger:-:ion.
The next day Mr. Speakes described
reports seeking to tone drwn 1 he Jour-
nal's article as the product of "mid-
level State Department officials" who
did not know what they were talking
about He said the real decision-
makers, such as Admiral Poindexter
and Shultz, ~ In G~ State George P.
But officials said today that Mr.
Shultz was also dismayed by The Jour-
nal's article and had made his feelings
known to Admiral Po4tdexter. That
day and after, State Department
spokesmen and other officials there
and in other departments were careful
not to endorse The Journal's article.
In any event, The Journal's report
set off a spate of similar accounts
about new evidence on Colonel Qadda-
fl's terrorist network, about the Admin-
istration's seeking to provoke Colonel
Qaddafi into an attack on American
ships then on a routine exercise in the
eastern Mediterranean, about the colo-
nel's sanity, and about active coup ef-
forts in Libya. These were precisely
the points officials said had been called
for in the memos recommending the
disinformation campaign.
Unintended Chain of Events
But me news accounts set off a chain
of events that officials said was neither
intended nor expected by the policy
memos and discussions of mid-August !
The intent, they said, was twofold. The
first was to let the naval exercises and
other military activity "speak for
themselves." The second was to have
the various rumors and threats about
Colonel Qaddafi appear in the Euro-
pean, Middle Eastern and North At-
7?ican press.
In those news centers, the reports
could have their impact on Colonel
Qaddafi without being directly trace-
able to the Administration. Having the
reports appear overseas would also di-
minish expected European concerns
that the Administration was preparing
to bomb Libya once ataitt4
i -ntit+ued
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American planes had bombed Libya
on April 14. This was done after strong
evidence had accumulated about
Libyan involvement in a terrorist at-
tack against a discotheque in West Ber-
lin, in which two Americans were killed
and many wounded. Official European
reaction to the American attack was
sharply negative.
In mid-August the Administration
was once again engaged in trying to en-
list European cooperation against
Libya. These efforts, officials said,
were derailed by The Journal's article
and similar ones that followed.
One such effort sought to enlist
France in a joint military campaign in
Chad to drive out Libyan forces in that
country. The French Government told
the State Department no after The
Journal's article.
Walters Made European Tour
The other effort was by Vernon A.
Walters, the chief American represent-
ative to the United Nations. He was set
to tour major West European capitals
to enlist support for tightening sanc-
tions against Libya. Most news reports
at that time in late August and Septem-
ber said, based on Administration offi-
cials, that he was carrying new and
convincing evidence that Colonel Qad-
dafi was behind recent acts of terror-
ism.
Officials said Mr. Walters had no
new and hard intelligence information
to convey, and that in any event, the
news articles had already soured the
European allies on his mission.
But in California and in Washington,
the battle was still raging over whether
The Journal's article was correct and
whether there was hard and conclusive
evidence.
At one point, Mr. Speakes said the ar-
ticle was "authoritative but not author-
ized." A senior White House official
added that there was "hard evidence."
He did so only after trying to say sim-
ply that the evidence was of "varying
credibility."
At that time, more than a dozen offi-
cials in Washington were saying that
there were "indications" of renewed
terrorist activity, that these reports
were stronger and weaker in different
cases, but that it had become ex-
tremely difficult to prove Libyan in-
volvement. That was because Colonel
Qaddafi had apparently stopped using
his embassies overseas to do the work
and was working through Libyan air
line offices and third parties.
Who Leaked Information?
Much of the confusion in late August
and September, as again today, sur-
rounded the question of who leaked the
information in The Journal's article.
White House, State Department and
Pentagon officials almost unanimously
pointed the finger at Howard Teicher, a
member of Admiral Poindexter's staff
responsible for political-military af-
fairs. Mr. Teicher, officials said, was
asked about this and responded that he
had spoken to the author of The Jour-
nal's article. But he reportedly added
that the author had already obtained
all the basic information from other of-
ficials.
The officials said Admiral Poindex-
ter had never accused or reprimaned
Mr. Teicher.
But Mr. Speakes today continued to
stand by his earlier statements that
The Journal's article was "generally
correct."
But the accuracy of that statement
depends on the reading of The Jour-
nal's article, as Mr. Speakes sought to
point out. The front page part of the ar-
ticle is a series of unattributed asser-
tions about "collision," "new evi-
dence," new military action and the
like. But the continuation of the account
on inside pages is stated in a more
careful and restrained manner and is
attributed, and the information is simi-
lar to that provided by a number of Ad-
ministration officials at the time. That
second part of the article was gen-
erally considered accurate then and
now.
That leaves open the question of
whether the exaggerated thrust of the
article and of similar articles that fol-
lowed was deliberately inspired by sen-
ior Administration officials as a matter
of policy in accord with the disinforma-
tion campaign.
Memo's Existence Not Denied
Today, a senior Administration offt
cial did not deny the existence and au-
thenticity of the Poidexter memo as de-
scribed in The Post's report, nor did he
deny that there were other memos
about the disinformation effort.
"We have got an analysis going on
comparing memos that we have with
the story to find out exactly what
memo it is," he said.
But as to disinformation campaign in
the United States, he said,"That simply
is not the case, and that is unequivo-
cal."
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