MERCENARIES IN FATIGUES MEET IN NEVADA GLITTER

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP90-00806R000100320009-6
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 1
• Document Creation Date: December 22, 2016
• Document Release Date: September 9, 2010
• Sequence Number: 9
• Publication Date: September 23, 1984
• Content Type: OPEN SOURCE

Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2010/09/09: CIA-RDP90-00806R000100320009-6
ARTICLE APPEARED NEW YORK TIMES
ON PAGE 23 September 1984
Mercenaries in The two men killed in the o
Fatigues were teaching takeof eoffs a land no
the Nicaraguan rebel pilot at t a gs bs t t a base
near the border, Mr. Posey said, when
a
m eet in Nevada Glitter they suddenly took off into r. Posey!
to answer wer a a call for help. M Mr. said he assumed they were answering a
call from rebels who, the Government
By IVER PETERSON in Managua said, were attacking a
Sl 4l to The New York Times training camp at Santa Clara.
LAS VEGAS, Nev. Sept. 21 - If the' ceive Mr. Posey denies that the men took
presence of American mercenaries o PoSthurnotis awards foi. patriot- part in the fight. Perhaps mindful of!
p-' ism on behalf of the two American men the fears in many Americans' minds
posing Communists in Central Amer-I killed in the downing of the helicopter, about sending troops into another guer-
ica becomes an international issue, no James Powell and Dana Parker, rilla quagmire like Vietnam, others at
one would appear to be happier about its The two,, both Vietnam era ilots,; the convention echoed this theme, as-
than those who are doing the guerrilla were o
,ZA training and occasional fighting. serting that the anti-Communists
end their Baths bro
d
t wi
er read merely needed training.
They say that, as far as they are con- spec ation in ashen on ane se- "The don't need go
cerned, fighting Communism is some- where about whether the Central Intel y hem to d ale
thing America has lost the stomach for, t en-ce gency was there and fight for them," sai d Dace .
and if it takes a few freelance fighters nari 'es involvement inthie reRion. fie; a Marine Corps veteran and exec
yneed s
to show the way, so be it. But fWi fe Mr. Brown, Mr. Posey re- "The elver of Soldier t of Fortune.
"I keep saying, the only reason we're jected the notion of any Federal in- They have fighters Wnan hoy need it
down there is because the Congress volvement in his group's efforts in Cen. sol skills in training nonprofessional
won't let anyone else do the job," Rob- tral America. soldiers to fight."
ert K. Brown, publisher of Soldier of "Evervbod says'C.I A . C Mr. Dye recently returned from one
Fortune, declared. "If Washington we couldn't do this b ourselves," Mr. of the magazine-sponsored training i
would get its act together we wouldn't Mo at msey sissions to El Salvador, where he
have to do it for them." helped teach Salvadoran troops to use
"If the people in Washington would
th -millimeter `mortar given them
~.r. Brown's glossy monthly maga- draw a line across the map and say, "b
... ,_.L
zine is fii11 of 'rticl
y
e
pons and
d
__I~ L y a
venture. 1151 go"along with that," he went on. "But
circulation of 2C ,000 has made it possi- nobody's done that yet, so we're the
ble for Mr. Brown to put his publica- ones who are drawing the line. We're
tion's hearty anti-Communist message the ones making a stand."
into practice by sending half a dozen The founding of Civilian Military
military training teams, made up of Assistance in a restaurant in Decatur,
veterans like himself, to train the Sal- Ala., 13 months ago was the culmina-
vadoran Army in what he asserts.are tion of years of such expressions of
skills neglected by the 55-man United frustration. Like Mr. Posey. all of the
ol
d i
b
th
....ate ere mem
ve
n
e Central
ers VL11 "" -' ?
vador. The magazine pays to send its National Guard units in the Deep South American fighting, however. Many
volunteers, who teach the Salvadoran' and Vietnam veterans in their 30's or were like Bill Stone of Denver, a car-
Arm
infant
i
'
y
ry tact
cs and the use of 40
s stseething over the victory by; penter and Marine Corps veteran.
weapons in the Sa1 d
v
a oran Govern- ~ Hanoi. They were men of ordinary
ment's fight against leftist insurgents. lives and extraordinarily fierce anti-
Th
eme of Duty Taken Up
Soldier of Fortune held its fifth an-
nual convention here this week, and the
theme of duty neglected and taken up
again was a main topic among the
nearly 1,000 men wearing baggy com-
bat fatigues, grisly knives and jungle
boots who strode among the bored
blackjack dealers and people feeding
slot machines in the Hotel Sahara casi-
"We had been running into each
other at meetings and kind of talking
about doing something," said Mr.
Posey, a wiry, blue-eyed man who
owns a wholesale produce business in
Decatur and who has a stomach ulcer
that he nurses on coffee and cigarettes.
`We Decided to Send Me'
no. -- ?? ". ACLUJ JLIUL UUWM
"From t he he res Flight 007, and we knew nobody was
co" gm a rho ee "we'vdehad, a going to do anything about it, we de-
right now,said Thothere mas' v d o to chip in h and t send uld td San Sal-
valor to see coul se
to Posey, fight a founder and leader of. Civilian From San Saalvadoor r Mr
Military Assistance, an effort to train, lv. Posey went
and su 1 rebels o Ito Honduras and" finally got in touch
PP Y perating out of Hon-, with the rebels of the Nicaraguan
duras against the Sandinista Govern- Democratic Force. He - soon -began
merit of Nicaragua. E delivering them supplies, mostly cloth-
Interest in unofficial United States E ing.
help to anti-Communists in Central . Posey insists that everything his
America in general and Mr. Posey in," organization did was above board.
particular reached a new level recently "We said from the ve bewith the shooting down of a rebel heli- r ginning w"
were going"to do everyt thing legally,"
copter inside Nicaragua on Sept.1. T wo he said. "We talked to the customs do-
Americans and one rebel in the helicop- artment we talked to the
ter were killed. P post office,
Mr. Posey said his group wasp, we gated by spent three hours being investi-
lated to Soldier of For tune magazine. the as a.," he said. "The
He was attending the convention onl only gnssnd was o, butut snceng them i
at the invitation of Mr. Brown, to re- n'weapons t have and ammo, b since d t'
n t have the money for that, it t d didn''t
matter anyway."
a mortar at night," he said. "I spent 20
years in the Marine Corps and I don't
think I've ever had a more rewarding
time in my life than when I could see
the lights go on in these guys' minds
when somebody finally explained to
them how to use these weapons.11 ..
-
i a
buys aLC Luurc 111B man me
V.F.W., they're more gung-ho," he re-
marked cheerfully. "We thought it
would be fun to slip on the old cammies
and come on down and drink some beer
and yell a lot, and that's all we're
doing. As far as fighting in El Salvador,
forget it!"
"Cammies" are the camouflaged
jungle wear favored by the convention-
eers for casino wear.
STAT
Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2010/09/09: CIA-RDP90-00806R000100320009-6