FLIER SAYS HE BRIEFED NORTH ON CONTRA DROP

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP90-00965R000302540005-6
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 2
• Document Creation Date: December 22, 2016
• Document Release Date: September 26, 2012
• Sequence Number: 5
• Publication Date: February 4, 1987
• Content Type: OPEN SOURCE

STAT I
Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2012/09/26: CIA-RDP90-00965R000302540005-6
ARTICLE APP24A.Z. PHILADELPHIA INQUIRER
ON PAGE
4 February 1987
By Mark Fazzlollah,
Steve Stecklow
trr and flnke V -
"4 Inquirer Vrrillfiireau
Flier says he briefed
North on contra drop
WASHINGTON ? A crew member
who participated in a secret weapons
airdrop to contra rebels inside Nica-
ragua says he briefed former Na-
tional Security Council aide Oliver L.
North last April about the mission.
Three days later, on April 23, North
attended two meetings with Presi-
dent Reagan "which appeared to re-
late to Central American policy," ac-
cording to a Senate Intelligence
Committee report issued last week.
One of those meetings was also at-
tended by a CIA official who contra
sources say helped select sites for the
April 11 arms drop.
That arms delivery, the first by a
supposedly private network, was
guided by the commander of U.S.
military forces in El Salvador and
CIA operatives in Costa Rica, accord-
ing to crew members and contra
sources.
At the time, Congress had forbid-
den any direct or indirect U.S. mili-
tary assistance to, the contras. The
Senate Intelligence Committee re-
ported that it could not determine
from White House records what Rea-
gan was told at the April 23 meetings.
If Reagan was told about the U.S.
involvement in the arms supply mis-
sion, it would mean he knew of ap-
parent illegalities by his administra-
tion seven months earlier than he
has said he did.
White House deputy press secre-
tary Dan Howard said he could offer
no further information about the
April 23 meetings. He said the Intelli-
gence Committee had been told ev-
erything White House officials knew
about them.
The crew member who said he
briefed North is lain Crawford, 30, of
Fayetteville, N.C. In an interview,
Crawford described how he flew
from El Salvador to Dulles Airport
near Washington aboard a private
corporate jet on which North was a
passenger last April 20.
Crawford said he told North how
seven tons of rifles, grenades and
ammunition had been successfully
dropped the night of April 11 from a
Southern Air Transport plane to a
waiting contra unit in southern Nica-
ragua.
Upon hearing the details of the
mission, North nodded in approval
and seemed relieved, Crawford said.
"That was the air of the whole
thing," Crawford said. "Jesus, we got
away with it."
Reagan fired North in November
after the administration said it
learned that North may have ille-
gally diverted to the contras millions
of dollars in profits from covert U.S.
arms sales to Iran. North's attorney,
Brendan V. Sullivan Jr., declined to
comment on North's meetings with
Reagan or the account of the brief-
ing given by Crawford.
Crawford, a former Green Beret,
said he worked in Central America
as a parachute rigger between March
and May last year. preparing weap-
ons and other supplies for airdrops
and pushing them out of planes. Af-
ter he left Central America, he said,
his job was filled by Eugene Hasen-
fus, the only survivor of a contra
supply plane that was shot down in
southern Nicaragua on Oct. 5.
Crawford said he flew on numer-
ous missions in the supply operation,
including the Southern Air arms
flight into Nicaragua on April 11.
Crawford's role in the supply oper-
ation was confirmed by five other
crewmen and radio operators who
requested anonymity. Crawford also
produced photographs, pay stubs and
other records that documented his
work in Central America.
Crawford said he was 'told that
North had gone to Central America
in April "to meet with a bunch of
people and supposedly solve some
problems" in the contra supply oper-
ation.
According to Crawford and other
sources, North's return flight to the
United States was arranged by Rich-
ard B. Gadd, a retired Air Force com-
mando and president of American "We were not supposed to tell any-
National M ' Vi in the operation about it," he
ent?Ta-Crawford said Gadd, who said. "They said, 'This is going to be
also was aboard the flight, was his our own little party.'"
boss and had hired him for the con- David M. Kirstein, an attorney for
tra supply operation. Southern Air, confirmed that a
The plane, a seven-seat Lockheed Southern Air plane and crew were
Jetstar that was on loan to Southern used on the mission.
Air, flew first to Miami to drop off "They didn't do anything illegal,"
two airplane mechanics and then to he said.
Dulles Airport. At one point during He added that Southern officials
the flight, Crawford said. Gadd asked were "cooperating with all the fed-
him to tell North and two other men eral authorities" in Justice Depart-
who accompanied him about the ment and congressional probes of
first arms drop into Nicaragua. the contra supply effort.
"lain, go ahead and tell these gen-
tlemen basically what you did at the
party the other night," Crawford re-
called Gadd telling him.
Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2012/09/26: CIA-RDP90-00965R000302540005-6
Crawford said he kept his discus-
sion brief because North and the
other men indicated they did not
want the stewardess to overhear the
account.
"They kept nodding their heads at
the stewardess like she wasn't sup-
posed to know," the crewman said.
Crawford said he explained how
the weapons were first flown from
Aguacate, a secret Honduran mili-
tary airstrip used by the contras. to
llopango, a Salvadoran air torce base
in San Salvador. Crawford said he
did not know the origin of the weap-
ons or who paid for them.
Once in El Salvador, he said, the
munitions were repacked and loaded
on a Southern Air L-100 cargo plane,
which he said Gadd told him he had
rented for $4,000 an hour. At that
time, none of the supply network's
limited and aging fleet of aircraft
was capable of making the flight.
Crawford said.
"They needed a good bird and the
L400 was a Cadillac," he said.
The Southern Air crew first tried
to airdrop the weapons to a contra
unit in southern Nicaragua on the
night of April 10, Crawford said. But
after flying in Nicaraguan airspace
for about a half-hour without spot-
ting the contras, the plane returned
to El Salvador, he said. The next
night, he said, the crew tried again,
this time changing their entry route
into Nicaragua.
As the plane passed over the ap-
pointed drop zone, Crawford said,
the contras began setting bonfires
on a mountain. Upon seeing the
flames below, Crawford said he be-
gan pushing the weapons out of the
rear of the plane.
Crawford said he had been in-
structed by the Southern Air crew
not to discuss the arms flight with
other crew members in the supply
network.
Continued
Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2012/09/26: CIA-RDP90-00965R000302540005-6
Army Col. -James Steele, com-
mander of U.S. military forces in El
Salvador, helped plot the path of the
Southern Air arms drop, according to
an eyewitness. The weapons delivery
was made at a time when U.S. mili-
tary aid to the rebels was illegal
because of a congressional ban.
The Reagan administration has re-
peatedly said that the United States
did not provide military assistance to
the contras while the congressional
ban was in effect.
The first April 23 meeting with
North and Reagan, according to
White House documents, included a
discussion of a recent trip to Central
America by Assistant Secretary of
State Elliott Abrams.
Others in attendance included
Vice President Bush, Deputy Secre-
tary of State John Whitehead,
Abrams, White House chief of staff
Donald T. Regan, then-national secu-
rity adviser John M. Poindexter and
National Security Council senior di-
rector Donald Fortier, who was
North's boss, the Senate Intelligence
Committee reported.
The committee said that "no topic
is listed" in the White House docu-
ments for the second meeting. In
addition to Reagan and North, the
attendees included Regan, Poin-
dexter, a Central American security
official and his wife, and the senior
CIA officer from the Central Ameri-
can country, according to the com-
mittee.
Sources have identified the senior
ClA officer as the agency's station
chief in Costa Rica. Reliable contra
sources have said that he assisted in
planning the weapons delivery in
the April 11 air drop.
The station chief later was the sub-
ject of an internal CIA investigation
"concerning unauthorized contacts
with private supporters of the Nica-
raguan resistance," the Intelligence
Committee reported.
Asked for comment about the April
23 meetings, Howard, the White
House spokesman for national secu-
rity affairs, said, "Everything we've
got to say has been said to the inves-
tigating committees. ... If the com-
mittees couldn't make a determina-
tion as to what happened from the
documents we've turned over to
them, there's no way in hell we can
go back into this and find out now
what happened."
Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2012/09/26: CIA-RDP90-00965R000302540005-6