U.S. TARGETED QADDAFI COMPOUND AFTER TRACING TERROR MESSAGE

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP90-00965R000807570019-8
• Release Decision: RIFPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 2
• Document Creation Date: December 22, 2016
• Document Release Date: November 21, 2012
• Sequence Number: 19
• Publication Date: April 16, 1986
• Content Type: OPEN SOURCE

Declassified and Approved For Release 2012/11/21 : CIA-RDP90-00965R000807570019-8
-+'}' APPEARED WASHINGTON POST
ttti 16 April 1986
C .S. Targeted Qaddafi. Confound After Tracing Terror Message
By Bob Woodward and atrick E. Tyler
Washington Post Staff tern r
The Reagan administration bombed
Muammar Qaddafi's personal compound-
the nerve center of his regime-as one of
its primary targets in Monday's raid after
U.S. intelligence had traced key terrorist
communications and planning to the com-
plex, which is called the Bab Azizzia, or
"Splendid Gate," barracks, according to in-
formed sources.
The barracks complex was described yes-
terday as the operational headquarters of
the Libyan military and terrorist organiza-
tion, housing communications systems,
command staff, the official government ra-
dio station and a contingent of Qaddafi's
elite security troops deemed most loyal to
his revolutionary dictatorship.
Qaddafi maintains his residence in the
barracks, living in a. Bedouin-style tent
erected in a courtyard of the complex, but
the Libyan leader seldom stays more than
one night at any of his several residences as
a precaution against assassination by inter-
nal dissident elements or external enemies,
according to sources.
The targeting of Qaddafi's personal com-
pound raised concerns in the National Se-
curity Council that the military strike-
coming as it did in the midst of an admin-
istration covert action to undermine Qad-
dafi's rule-might violate an executive or-
der prohibiting any attempt by U.S. officials
to assassinate a foreign leader.
After investigating this question, sources
said, administration legal counselors ad-
vised that the strike could be justified as a
self-defensive and preemptive military at-
tack. Any deaths, the legal analysis held-
even the death of the head of state-could
not be considered political assassination.
[Libyan reports said yesterday that one
of Qaddafi's children, an adopted girl, had
been killed in the barracks and that his two
youngest sons were seriously injured.]
One high-level official said yesterday that
the three key messages cited by President
Reagan in his Monday night address to the
nation could not be traced unequivocally to
the "Splendid Gate" headquarters. Reagan
pointed to those specific messages as "ir-
refutable" evidence that the Libyan regime
ordered the terrorist bombing of a West
Berlin nightclub 11 days ago that killed two
people and wounded 230.
Another well-placed source, however,
said one of the three messages had been
traced to Qaddafi's command and control
center at the Bab Azizzia barracks.
One source yesterday said that new in-
telligence reports show that Libya is con-
tinuing, if not actually stepping up, planning
for terrorist attacks against U.S. targets in
the Middle East and Europe, The sours did
not interpret this as an ominous new devel-
opment, but rather as an indication that the
raid had not fundamentally changed
Libyan plans or attitudes.
The administration had by Monday ac-
cumulated substantial intelligence on addi-
tional Libyan terrorist plans, according to
one source. This source described the in-
telligence as showing "an orchestrated,
worldwide, centrally directed campaign of
terror directed roug the Libyan fp o-
matic c anne s and missions specifically tar-
geting Americans."
Several of er officials said yesterday af-
ternoon that it was too early to determine if
Monday's bombing raids at five key Libyan
targets were generating more terrorist
plans or deterring them. "That part of the
evaluation is still ongoing," one source said.
Since the Gulf of Sidra naval exercise
three weeks ago, intelligence reports show
that the terrorist-plans were "the clear pol-
icy of Tripoli" an not dust passive support
or occasional expressions of sympathy with
radical Arabs, according to this source.
Vernon A. Walters, the U.S. ambassador
to the United Nations, yesterday said "the
United States also has compelling evidence
of Libyan involvement in other planned at-
tacks," including a late March incident in
which police in Istanbul arrested two people
claiming to be Libyan-sponsored terrorists
planning attacks against the U.S. targets in
Turkey.
Earlier this month, Walters said, "France
expelled two Fatah Force 17 members re-
cruited by Libya to conduct another oper-
ation against the United States in Paris."
Fatah Force 17 is the security force under
the control of Palestine Liberation Organ-
ization leader Yasser Arafat.
Also, Walters said, "on April 6, a Libyan
plot to attack the U.S. Embassy in Beirut
resulted in a near miss by a 107-mm rocket
which exploded on launch."
The Libyan People's Bureau in Vienna
was planning a terrorist attack against an
unknown target there to take place on
Thursday this week, Walters told the U.N.
Security Council.
Stressing the scope of the Libyan plans,
W"
Declassified and Approved For Release 2012/11/21 : CIA-RDP90-00965R000807570019-8
 Declassified and Approved For Release 2012/11/21 : CIA-RDP90-00965R000807570019-8
d.
Walters also said that Libya has called "for
terrorist action and acts of aggression and
subversion against its neighbors, against
European countries and against places as
far away as Northern Ireland, the Philip.
Pines and Central America."
"More than 40 so-called Libyan diplomats
have been expelled from Western Europe
since 1983 for involvement in criminal ac-
tivities," Walters said.
The decision by the United States to at-
tack Qaddafi's Splendid Gate barracks was
considered significant y a number o
sources. U.S. iigence reports o en re-
ferred to the well-fortified barracks as "the
presidential villa." On Ma 8, 1984, when a _
group rebels attempted to overthrow ad-
s, they reporte y attac t o s
compoun , w is is surroun e y a - oot
wall and guar e y vie - a
A top secret vn nary d1 y assessment"
done by the Central Intelligence Agency
and other U. . inte igence agencies in June
1984 clearly antics ted more cou at-
tempts and said "disaffect elements in
the Lib an milita could be s urred to as-
sassination attempts or to cooperate wi
the exiles against Qaddafi."
In fact, sources said, there were three
more coup attempts in 1985, at least two of
them resulting in the executions of dozens
of Libyan army officers charged with com-
plicity in the plots.
Declassified and Approved For Release 2012/11/21 : CIA-RDP90-00965R000807570019-8