ARMS TO EL SALVADOR: LOOK WHO'S TALKING

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP91-00587R000200740018-2
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 1
• Document Creation Date: December 22, 2016
• Document Release Date: June 25, 2010
• Sequence Number: 18
• Publication Date: February 8, 1986
• Content Type: OPEN SOURCE

Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2010/06/29: CIA-RDP91-00587R000200740018-2
WASHINGTON POST
8 February 1986
Arms to El Salvador:
Look Who's Talking
The argument over whether the Sandinistas are providing
arms, training, and command and control to guerrillas in El Sal-
vador has readied absurd proportions.
In recent weeks letters have appeared an this page from.
David MacMichael, Paul Reichler and Wayne Smith claiming
that there is no evidence to support the claims of the adminis-
tration and the governments of El Salvador, Costa Rica and
Honduras.
The position of Nicaragua's attorney, Paul Reichler, is clear.
In a session with journalists at the Nicaraguan Embassy last
August, he stated that he had told Daniel Ortega that if the ad-
ministration was correct in its assertions, be could not take
Nicaragua's case to the World Court. Ortega assured him that
the charges were untrue, and Redder accepted Ortega's asset-
am. Redder chooses to believe Daniel Ortega and not the
president of the United States.
David MacMichael presents a more complicated __wd in
many ways more pathetic-case. Trading on what has became
a near obsession in the United States w mono a~tv to
the. dissident and secure in the lmonnledge that as a matter of
oc1 he L not comment on the work its o~rmer-ern-
ployees, continues to make his case ba,-wd on four-year-old
ayne o be vying for the role of profes-
sional dissident guru, disingenuously cites the cables he saw
while he headed the U.S. interests section in Cuba, also some
four years ago. What the average layman might not know-but
which Smith surely does-is that while Smith was privy to
some information of the type he describes, he had access to
only a limited amount.
Both Smith and MacMichael acknowledge that the Sandinis-
tas were supplying arms to the Salvadoran guerrillas in 1981,
thus giving the he to denials by Father IYEscoto and Coman-
date Ortega and calling attention to Reichler's credulity.
In fact, the U.S. government has long stated that the weap?
ono flows to El Salvador have shown periodic increases and de-
creases in response to the guerrillas' needs and the security of.'
the supply net. One of the periods of extraordinary activity was
late 1980 and early 1981, when the Sart I ietas helped supply
the guerrillas for their fauled "final offenhsive" and their initial
arms buildup
In 1981, the US. government made the determination to
end economic assistance to Nicaragua because of this arms traf- ,
fiddng. In the i ntervenkhg years, the government's case has
been strengthened by testimony of former Sandinista officials
and Salvadoran guerrillas, press aooamts and an abundance of
intelligence edormation, much of it now declassified. To satisfy
the demand for State Department "evidence," the State De-
p published a booklet called "Revolution Beyond Our
Borders;" which inhchdes both public and previously classified
documentation. It makes a compelling case: Sandinista support
for the Salvadoran guerrillas has continued to the present day,
as has Sandinista subversion in Honduras, Costa Rica and
Guatemala.
If Reichler, MacMichael, and Smith wish to continue to op.
pose U.S. policy toward Nicaragua, that is certainly their right.'
But if they hope to be convincing, they would be well advised to
stop denying the obvious. j,.,, ,.,,,.
The writer is acting director of the Office of Press and Ajblic
Affairs for the State Department's Bureau of Inter-American
Affairs.
STAT
Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2010/06/29: CIA-RDP91-00587R000200740018-2