TARGET QADDAFI

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP90-00965R000402820006-3
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 9
• Document Creation Date: December 22, 2016
• Document Release Date: February 28, 2012
• Sequence Number: 6
• Publication Date: February 22, 1987
• Content Type: OPEN SOURCE

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ON PAGE ivt:W TUrcr` i11ic3 mnur,LLI1L
22 February 1987
TAIMETL
QADDAFI
J By Se moW M l$ Lt
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EIGHTEEN AMERICAN WARPLANES SET
out from Lakenheath Air Base in England
last April 14 to begin a 14-hour, 5,400-mile
round-trip flight to Tripoli, Libya. It is now
clear that nine of those Air Force F-111's had an
unprecedented peacetime mission. Their tar-
gets: Col. Muammar el-Qaddafi and his family.
The mission, aut oriz by the White
House, was to be the culmination of a five-year clandestine
effort by the Reagan Administration to eliminate Qaddafi,
who had been described a few days earlier by the President
as the "mad dog of the Middle East."
Since early 1981, the Central Intelligence Agency had been
encouraging and abetting Libyan exile groups and foreign
governments, especially those of Egypt and France, in their
efforts to stage a coup d'etat - and kill, if necessary - the bi-
zarre Libyan strongman. But Qaddafi, with his repeated
threats to President Reagan and support of international ter-
rorism, survived every confrontation and in the spring of
1986 continued to be solidly in control of Libya's 3 million citi-
zens. Now the supersonic Air Force F-111's were ordered to
accomplish what the C.I.A. could not.
That the assassination of Qaddafi was the primary goal of
the Libyan bombing is a conclusion reached after three
months of interviews with more than 70 current and former
officials in the White House, the State Department. the Cen-
tral Intelligence Agency, the National Security Agency and
the Pentagon. These sources, a number of whom were closely
involved in the planning of the Tripoli raid, agreed to talk only
if their names were not used. Many of them, however, cor-
roborated key information. The interviews depict a White
House decision-making process that by early last year was
relying on internal manipulation and deceit to shield true
policy from the professionals in the State Department and
the Pentagon.
The interviews also led to these findings:
? The attempt last April on Qaddafi's life was plotted by a
small group of military and civilian officials in the National
Security Council. These officials, aware of the political risks,
operated with enormous care. A back channel was set up to
limit information to a few inside the Government; similar
steps had been taken the year before to shield the equally
sensitive secret talks and arms dealings with Iran.
^ Much of the secret planning for the Iran and Libyan
operations took place simultaneously, so that the Administra-
tion was pursuing the elimination of one Middle East source
of terrorism while it was trading arms with another. The two
missions involved the same people, including John M. Poindex-
ter, then the national security adviser, and Oliver L. North, the
N.S.C.'s deputy director for political-military affairs.
Seymour M. Hersh is working on a book on the Reagan Ad-
ministration's foreign policy for Random House.
^ There was widespread concern and anger inside the Na-
tional Security Agency over the Administration's handling of
the Libyan messages intercepted immediately after the
April 5 terrorist bombing of a West Berlin discotheque. The
White House's reliance on these messages as "irrefutable" evi-
dence that Libya was behind that bombing was immediately
challenged by some allies, most notably West Germany. Some
N.S.A. experts now express similar doubts because the normal
intelligence channels for translating and interpreting such mes-
sages were purposely bypassed. As of this month, the N.S.A.'s
North African specialists had still not been shown these inter-
cepts.
^ William J. Cahen Director of Central Intelligence,
personally served as the intelligence officer for a secret task
force on Libya set up in mid-1981, and he provided intelli-
gence that could not be confirmed by his subordinates. Some
task force members suspected that much of Casey's informa-
tion, linking Qaddafi to alleged "hit teams" that were said to
be targeting President Reagan and other senior White House
aides, was fabricated by him.
President Reagan's direct involvement in the intrigue
against Qaddafi - as in the Iran-contra crisis - is difficult to
assess. The President is known to have relied heavily on
Casey's intelligence and was a strong supporter of covert ac-
tion against Qaddafi. But Mr. Reagan initially resisted when
the National Security Council staff began urging the bombing
of Libya in early 1986. Some former N.S.C. staff members ac-
knowledge that they and their colleagues used stratagems to
win the President over to their planning.
THE PLANNERS FOR THE LIBYAN RAID AVOIDED
the more formal White House Situation Room, where such
meetings might be noticed by other staffers, and met instead
in the office of former Navy Capt. Rodney B. McDaniel, the
N.S.C.'s executive secretary. The small ad hoc group, for-
mally known as the Crisis Pre-planning Group, included
Army Lieut. Gen. John H. Moellering of the Joint Chiefs of
Staff; Michael H. Armacost, Under Secretary of State for
political affairs, and Richard L. Armitage, Assistant Secre-
tary of Defense for international security affairs. Most of the
planning documents and option papers on the bombing were
assigned to a small subcommittee headed by North; this com-
mittee included Howard J. Teicher, the N.S.C.'s Near East
specialist, and Capt. James R. Stark of the Navy, who was as-
signed to the N.S.C.'s office of political-military affairs.
For North, a Marine lieutenant colonel who had emerged
by early 1985 as the ranking National Security Council opera-
tive on terrorism, the Libyan raid was a chance to begin a
new phase in the American counterterrorism struggle - the
direct use of military force. He had served as a member of
Vice President Bush's Task Force on Combating Terrorism,
whose report - made public last February - presciently
summarized the pros and cons of the mission:
"Use of our well-trained and capable military forces offers
an excellent chance of success if a military option can be im-
plemented. Successful employment, however, depends on
timely and refined intelligence and prompt positioning of
forces. Counterterrorism missions are high-risk/high-gain
operations which can have a severe negative impact on U.S.
prestige if they fail."
CoflhfluiI
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At the time of the attack on Libya, North, Poindexter and
Teicher had been deeply involved in the Administration's se-
cret arms dealings with Iran for nearly a year; they also
knew that funds from those dealings were being funneled
from a Swiss bank account controlled by North to the Admin-
istration-backed contras fighting against the Sandinista Gov-
ernment in Nicaragua.
North has told associates that only he and a few colleagues
worked on the targeting of Qaddafi and that they left no writ-
ten record. " 'There was no executive order to kill and no ad-
ministrative directive to go after Qaddafi' " one former
N.S.C. official quotes North as saying. "They've covered their
tracks beautifully."
EVEN THE OFFICIAL BOMBING ORDERS
supplied by the White House to the Pentagon
did not cite as targets the tent where Qaddafi
worked or his family home. Instead, North
has told colleagues, the stated targets were
the command-and-control center and admin-
istrative buildings of El-Azziziya Barracks in
Tripoli, none of which were struck by bombs,
as well as the military side of the Tripoli airport and a com-
mando training site in the nearby port city of Sidi Bilal, which
were hit by the other nine F-111's. Also mistakenly hit by one
F-111 assigned to attack the barracks was a heavily popu-
lated residential area of Tripoli near the French Embassy.
The shielded orders explain a series of strong denials after
the bombing, especially by State Department officials, when
it became clear that Qaddafi's personal quarters had been a
primary target. That, too, was part of the White House or-
chestration, officials acknowledge.
One well-informed Air Force intelligence officer says,
"There's no question they were looking for Qaddafi. It was
briefed that way. They were going to kill him." An Air Force
pilot involved in highly classified special operations acknowl-
edges that "the assassination was the big thing."
Senior Air Force officers confidently predicted prior to the
raid that the nine aircraft assigned to the special mission had
a 95 percent "P.K." - probable kill. Each of the nine F-111's
carried four 2,000-pound bombs. The young pilots and weap-
ons-systems officers, who sit side-by-side in the cockpit, were
provided with reconnaissance photographs separately de-
picting, according to one Air Force intelligence officer,
"where Qaddafi was and where his family was."
The mission was the first combat assignment for most of
the fliers. Qaddafi's home and his camouflaged Bedouin tent,
where he often worked throughout the night, were inside the
grounds of El-Azziziya. The notion of targeting Qaddafi's
family, according to an involved N.S.C. aide, originated with
several senior C.I.A. officers, who claimed that in Bedouin
culture Qaddafi would be diminished as a leader if he could
not protect his home. One aide recalls a C.I.A. briefing in
which it was argued that "if you really get at Qaddafi's house
- and by extension, his family - you've destroyed an impor-
tant connection for the people in terms of loyalty."
In charge of the mission was Col. Sam W. Westbrook 3d, a
Rhodes scholar and 1963 Air
Force Academy graduate
who was subsequently
promoted to brigadier general
and reassigned in September
to the prestigious post of Com-
mandant of Cadets at the
Academy. A special biography
made available to recruiting
officers for the Academy in-
cludes a typewritten adden-
dum stating that Westbrook
led the Libya raid and caution-
ing that he "is not cleared to
address this subject under any
circumstances."
Israeli intelligence, North
has told associates, pin-
pointed Qaddafi's exact loca-
tion during the long night of
April 14, as the Air Force
jets, bucking strong head-
winds, flew around France,
Portugal and Spain to the
Mediterranean. The last fix
on Qaddafi's location came at
11:15 P.M., Libyan time, two
hours and 45 minutes before
the first bombs fell. He was
still at work in his tent.
In the hours following the
raid, Qaddafi's status was not
known, but inside the White
House there was excitement,
one N.S.C. staff aide recalls,
upon initial reports that he
had not been heard from.
Teicher reacted to the belief
that Qaddafi had been killed
by excitedly telling col-
leagues: "I'll buy everybody
Force officer says: "The fact
is, they got into the exact tar-
get areas they had planned. It
was an ironic set of circum-
stances that prevented Qad-
dafi from being killed. It was
just an accident, a bad day."
The officer is referring to the
fact that the laser-guidance
systems on four of the nine
F-ill's attacking Qaddafi's
quarters malfunctioned prior
to the attack. The pilots had
to abort the mission before
reaching the target, thus
eliminating at least 16 more
bombs that could have been
dropped. The high-technology
system that was to insure
Qaddafi's death may have
spared his life.
The C.I.A. already knew
how difficult a target Qaddafi
could be. In late 1981, accord-
ing to a senior Government
lunch, and not at the Ex- I official, after Libyan forces
change," an inexpensive Fri- returned from Chad, Qaddafi
day night staff hangout. promoted the commander of
Shortly afterward, a C.I.A.
operative in Tripoli informed
the agency that the Libyan
leader had survived but was
his successful invasion to
general and invited him to his
desert headquarters. On the
jeep ride
the new general
,
said to be shaken by the I
bombing and the injuries to pulled out a revolver and
his family. All eof Qadda- fired point-blank at Qaddafi.
fi's children, eight i well as his The C.LA. knew of the plot
in advance, the official says,
wife, Safiya, were hospital- but was unable to learn for
ized, suffering from shock several days that the officer
and various injuries. His 15- I had missed and been shot to
month-old adopted daughter, death by the Colonel's se-
Hana, died several hours
after the raid.
Poststrike infrared intelli-
gence photographs showed
that the bombs, guided by the
F-111's sophisticated on-
board laser system, left a line
of craters that went past both
Qaddafi's two-story stucco
house and his tent. Newsmen
reported that the bombs had
damaged his tent and the por-
ticoed family home.
The Air Force viewed Qad-
dafi's survival as a fluke. Two
senior officers separately
compare his escape with Hit-
ler's in the assassination at-
tempt led by Count Claus von
Stauftenberg in 1944, and a
four-star general, after de-
scribing in an interview the
tight bomb pattern near Qad-
dafi's tent, says resignedly,
"He must have been in the
head."
Another well-informed Air
curity guard, believed to be
an East German. After the
attempt, Qaddafi was not
seen publicly for 40 days.
FTER THE RAID ON
Tripoli, any sugges-
tion that the United
States had specifically tar-
geted Qaddafi and his family
was brushed aside by senior
Administration officials, who
emphasized that the Govern-
ment had no specific knowl-
edge of Qaddafi's where-
abouts that night.
Secretary of State George
P. Shultz told newsmen, "We
are not trying to go after Qad-
dafi as such, although we
think he is a ruler that is bet-
ter out of his country." One of
the Air Force's goals, he said,
was to "hit directly" at the
guard around Qaddafi.
At a closed budget hearing
before the House Appropria-
tions defense subcommittee
GOAt1 W
Ck
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six days after the raid, Sec-
retary of Defense Caspar
W. Weinberger was ques-
tioned about the Air Force
targeting by Democratic
Representative Norman D.
Dicks of Washington. "Mr.
Secretary, you are a lawyer,"
Dicks said, according to a
subsequently released manu-
script. "Can you characterize
this in any other way than an
attempt to eliminate a for-
eign leader?"
"Oh, yes, Mr. Dicks, we
sure can," Weinberger re-
sponded "His living quarters
is a loose term. This is a com-
mand-and-control building.
His living quarters vary from
night to night. He never
spends two nights in the same
place. His actual living quar-
ters are a big Bedouin sort of
tent. We are not targeting
him individually."
When questioned for this
article, Adm. William J.
Crowe Jr., chairman of the
Joint Chiefs of Staff, said
through a spokesman that
there had been what he
termed "some loose talk"
during planning sessions
about "getting" Qaddafi, but,
he went on, such targeting
was "never part of the plan."
The spokesman added,
"There was a lot of bantering
at these meetings," but
Crowe and his aides "did not
take the bravado seriously."
A Congressional aide who
participated in classified
briefings on the raid says he
understood all along that the
denials of Administration of-
ficials of any assassination
plans were pro forma. "I
found myself feeling some-
what ambivalent," he re-
called, because of the Air
Force's target - "you know,
'Scum of the earth.' "
A senior American foreign
service officer on assignment
in the Middle East at the time
of the raid recalls having few
illusions: "As abhorrent as
we find that kind of mission,
the Arabs don't. The first
word I got was, 'You screwed
it up again.' We missed."
Only one F-111 was re-
ported missing during the at-
tack and the overall opera-
tion was subsequently de-
scribed by Weinberger as a
complete success..
In private, however, there
was acute disappointment in
the White House and Penta-
gon, military officials say, be-
cause five of the nine F-11 I's
had failed to engage their tar-
get - besides the four mal-
functioning guidance sys-
tems, human error aboard
another F-111 resulted in the
bombing of the residential
area, killing more than 100
people.
There was criticism from
abroad, but the attack was
strongly supported by the
American public and Con-
gress. A New York Times/
CBS poll, taken the day after
the raid, showed that 77 per-
cent of those queried ap-
proved, although many
voiced fear that it would lead
to further terrorism.
One reason for the wide-
spread support was a collec-
tive sense of revenge: the
White House had repeatedly
said prior to the attack that it
had intercepted a series of
communications, said to be
"irrefutable" and a "smoking
gun," which seemed to di-
rectly link Libya to the April
5 bombing of the La Belle dis-
cotheque in West Berlin, in
which an American service-
man was killed and at least 50
others injured. There were
also nearly 200 civilian casu-
alties, including one death.
ANY IN THE IN-
telligence com-
munity believe that
the Reagan Administration's
obsession with Libya began
shortly after the President's
inauguration in 1981, and re-
mained a constant preoccu-
pation.
Director of Central Intelli-
gence Casey and Secretary of
State Alexander M. Haig Jr.
took office prepared to move
against Qaddafi, who had
been utilizing a number of
former C.I.A. operatives,
most notably Edwin Wil-
son and Fran . T,~ernil-~o
help set up terrorist training
camps.
There were other reasons
for American concern. Qad-
dafi was relentlessly anti-Is-
rael, supported the most ex-
treme factions in Syria and
opposed the more moderate
regimes of Jordan's King
Hussein and Egypt's Anwar
el-Sadat. There also were re-
ports early in 1981 that Libya
was attempting to become a
nuclear power, and Qaddafi's
often-stated ambition to set
up a new federation of Arab
and Moslem states in North
Africa alarmed policy
makers, especially after his
successful invasion early in
the year of Chad. One of the
areas seized by Libyan forces
was believed to be rich in ura-
nium.
Qaddafi was further
viewed as having close ties to
the Soviet Union, a point re-
peatedly driven home in a 15-
minute color movie that was
prepared by the C.I.A. in 1981
for the President and key
White House officials. It was
clear early in the Adminis-
tration, one former White
House aide recalls, that the
best way to get the Presi-
dent's attention was through
visual means. The movie,
which substituted for a writ-
ten psychological profile of
Qaddafi, the aide says, was
meant "to show the nature of
the beast. If you saw it, there's little
doubt that he had to go."
Libya became a dominant topic of
the Administration's secret delibera-
tions on C.I.A. covert action. At senior
staff meetings, one participant later
recalled, Haig repeatedly referred to
Qaddafi as a "cancer to be cut out."
In mid-1981, Haig put William P.
Clark, the Deputy Secretary of State,
in charge of a secret task force to look
into the Qaddafi issue. The initial goal
of the small group, which included a
representative from the Department
of Energy, was to evaluate economic
sanctions, such as an embargo on
Libyan oil purchases. Libya was then
supplying about 10 percent of total
American imports of crude oil, and
an estimated 2,000 American citizens
lived in Libya. Such planning was
hampered by the fact that Libyan
crude oil was of high quality and
much in demand. Clark, whose confir-
mation hearings had been marked by
controversy over his lack of knowl-
edge about foreign affairs, turned to
Robert C. (Bud) McFarlane, then the
State Department counselor, for help.
One immediate step, taken early in
1981, was to encourage Egypt and
other moderate Arab states to con-
tinue their longstanding plotting
against Qaddafi. In May, the State
Department ordered the closing of
the Libyan diplomatic mission in
Washington and gave Libyan diplo-
mats five days to leave the country.
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There were reports in American
newspapers, leaked by Government
officials, suggesting that Libyan op-
position to Qaddafi was growing and
citing the defection of Mohammed
Magaryef, a former Libyan Auditor
General living in exile in London who
would become the focal point of
American, French and Egyptian ef-
forts over the next four years to over-
throw Qaddafi.
In August 1981, President Reagan
approved a series of naval war
games inside the so-called "line of
death" - the 120-mile limit claimed
by Libya in the Gulf of Sidra. As ex-
pected, the Libyan Air Force rose to
the bait and Navy jets shot down two
SU-22 warplanes about 60 miles off
the Libyan coast.
Libya accused the United States of
"international terrorism." According
to an account later provided to the
columnist Jack Anderson, an enraged
Qaddafi, in a telephone call to Ethio-
pian leader Lieut. Col. Mengistu Haile
Mariam after the planes were shot
down, threatened to assassinate
President Reagan.
One former Cabinet-level official,
who served in a national security
position in 1981, recalls that there
was no question that the "only thing
to do with Qaddafi was kill him. He
belonged dead." However, White
House and C.I.A. planning throughout
much of 1981 was hampered, the for-
mer official says, by President Car-
ter's 1978 executive order against as-
sassinations. "The thought was to get
a third party," the former official
said - such as Egypt's President
Sadat, who some in the White House
believed was within a few days of
moving against Qaddafi when he was
assassinated on Oct. 6,1981. On Oct. 7,
Magaryef and other exiles formed a
National Front for the Salvation of
Libya, based in London, "to rid Libya
and the world of the scourge of Qad-
daft's regime."
In the weeks following Sadat's
death, newspapers and television re-
ported a barrage of Qaddafi death
threats to Reagan and senior Admin-
istration officials. Secret Service pro-
tection was ordered for the Presi-
dent's three top aides, Edwin Meese
3d, James A. Baker 3d and Michael K.
Deaver, and security for senior Cabi-
net members, including Haig and
Weinberger, was increased Haig, at
a news conference, told newsmen:
"We do have repeated reports coming
to us from reliable sources that Mr.
Qaddafi has been funding, sponsor-
ing, training, harboring terrorist
,groups, who conduct activities
against the lives of American diplo-
mats."
There were further reports that
five Libyan-trained terrorists had ar-
rived in the United States to assassi-
nate the President and some of his
aides. Mr. Reagan publicly endorsed
those reports. We have the evidence
and he knows it," he told newsmen,
referring to Qaddafi.
ACCORDING TO KEY
sources, there was little doubt
inside Clark's task force
about who was responsible for the
spate of anti-Qaddafi leaks - the
C.I.A., with the support of the Presi-
dent, Haig and Clark. "This item
stuck in my craw," one involved offi-
cial recalls. "We came out with this
big terrorist threat to the U.S. Gov-
ernment. The whole thing was a com-
plete fabrication."
Casey began traveling regularly to
the State Department to attend policy
meetings of the Clark group. He was
accompanied at first by his deputy,
Vice Adm. Bobby R. Inman, a long-
time intelligence officer who had
served as director of the National Se-
curity Agency in the Carter Adminis-
tration.
According to one participant, Casey
claimed to have reports and inter-
cepts directly linking Qaddafi to ter-
rorist activities. "I listened to Casey's
pitch and it was going for broke," the
participant recalls. "'We're going to
take care of Qaddafi.' Everyone was
very careful - no one uttered the
word assassination - but the mes-
sage was clear. 'This matter has to be
resolved."'
If Casey's intelligence was correct,
the participant recalls, it threatened
the day-to-day ability of American of-
ficials to travel internationally.
Inman attended only one meeting, at
which he said little.
The participant, experienced in in-
telligence matters, was struck by In-
man's sudden disappearance and the
lack of specificity in Casey's presen-
tations. Privately, Inman confirmed
to a task force member that there
was no further specific intelligence
on the Libyan "death threats." A trip
to N.S.A. headquarters was arranged
for the member, there was nothing in
the raw intercepts other than "broad
mouthings" by Qaddafi, the
official recalls.
During this time, the Amer-
ican intelligence community
consistently reported that
Iran and its religious leader-
ship were far more involved
than Libya in international
terrorism. Qaddafi was
known to have brutally mur-
dered former Libyan offi-
cials, but he was not known to
have acted on his many
threats against Western
political leaders. An intelli-
gence official who has had di-
rect access to communica-
tions intelligence reports
says, "The stuff I saw did not
make a substantial case that
we had a threat. There was
nothing to cause us to react
as we have, saying Qaddafi is
public enemy No. 1." -
Inman soon resigned from
the C.I.A. and Casey contin-
ued to handle the intelligence
briefings to Clark on Libyan
terrorism. Some task force
members were convinced
that Clark's aides, including
McFarlane and Michael A
Ledeen then a State art-
efti"nt onsultant, were leak-
ing Casey's reports. One task
force official eventually con-
cluded that Casey was in ef-
fect running an operation in-
side the American Govern-
ment: "He was feeding the
disinformation into the [intel-
ligencel system so it would
be seen as separate, inde-
pendent reports" and taken
seriously by other Govern-
ment agencies.
There were reprisals
planned if Qaddafi did strike.
By the early 1980's, the Navy
had completed elaborate con-
tingency plans for the mining
of Libyan harbors, and sub-
marines bearing the mines
were dispatched to the Medi-
terranean during training ex-
ercises. In late 1981, a White
House official was sent to
Lajes Air Base in the Azores,
one N.S.C. aide recalls, to in-
sure that it was secure in
case an air raid against
Libya was ordered. "When
Haig was talking about the
hit team," the aide recalled,
"we were ready to bomb."
None of Qaddafi's alleged
threats materialized.
i
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I N JANUARY 1982,
Clark succeeded Richard
V. Allen as national se-
curity adviser and quickly
named McFarlane as a depu-
ty. McFarlane brought in
Donald R. Fortier from the
State Department's policy
planning staff. The two had
worked together on defense
issues as Congressional aides
in the last days of the Carter
Administration.
Later, Howard Teicher, an-
other McFarlane protege
from the State Department,
joined the staff. North, who
had come to the White House
on a temporary basis in the
summer of 1981, was kept on.
He would establish a close
working relationship with
McFarlane. "He accompa-
nied McFarlane to meetings
with the President and the
Chairman of the Joint Chiefs
1 that other N.S.C. staffers
rtici ate in" one
a
M UAMMAR EL-QAD-
dafi again became
an obsession in
Washington after the June
1985 hijacking of an Athens-
to-Rome Trans World Air-
lines flight by a group of
Lebanese Shiite Moslems.
One Navy diver on board was
killed and 39 other Amer-
icans were held hostage for
17 days. There was no evi-
dence linking the hijacking to
Libya, but within the Reagan
Administration feelings ran
high that action must be
taken, and striking against
Iran and Syria wouldn't do.
By July, the N.S.C. was se-
cretly involved in conversa.
tions with Israeli officials
over the possibility of trading
American arms to Iran for
hostages. And any attempt to
target Syria would be
strongly resisted by the Pen-
tagon. Syria's superb antiair-
craft defenses had shot down
would not v
r an American Navy tighter
recall's former colleagues plane in 1983 and one naviga-
Arter a year and a lman Jr., had been captured.
Clark, who had d a poor rela- tionship with Nancy Reagan He was later released to the
and the men who ran the Rev. Jesse Jackson, one of
White House staff, resigned. the President's most severe
The President picked McFar- critics.
lane as his successor, and The target was obvious. In
McFarlane named Fortier July, McFarlane opened a
and Vice Adm. John Poindex- high-level Pre policy
ter as deputy assistants. meeting with the Fortier was given the author- by declaring that diplomatic
ity to delve into any N.S.C. ac- and economic pressure had
tivity, including covert ac- failed to curb Qaddafi's sup-
tion. port for terrorism and much
A critical step occurred in stronger measures had to be
early 1984 when, after a taken.
series of political defeats on During the late summer
ntra-aid issue in Con- and early fall, there was
co
h
1984 C.I.A. assessment con-
cluding that it would be possi-
ble to call on "disaffected ele-
ments" in the Libyan mili-
tary who could be "spurred to
assassination attempts or to
cooperate with the exiles
against Qaddafi."
United States officials
knew of at least two major
French operations to assassi-
nate or overthrow Qaddafi in
1984, both directed by the Di-
rection de la Security Exter-
ieure, the French counter-
part of the C.I.A. According to
a participant, officials at the
National Security Agency
monitored cable traffic from
C.I.A. headquarters to its sta-
tion in Paris authorizing the
sharing of highly sensitive in-
telligence, including satellite
photographs and communi-
cations intercepts, in support
of the operations. Teams of
Libyan exiles were armed
with Israeli and other third-
party weaponry, brought to
the Sudan for combat train-
ing and infiltrated through
Tunisia into Libya.
Neither plot succeeded, al-
though one, in May 1984, re-
sulted in a pitched battle with
Qaddafi loyalists near El-Az-
ziziya Barracks. Libya later
reported that 15 members
of the exile group had
been slain. Qaddafi emerged
unscathed.
THE SECRET WHITE
House planning escalated
dramatically after terrorist
bombings in airports in
Vienna and Rome on Dec. 27,
1985, killed 20 people, five of
them Americans.
Within days, the N.S.C.'s
Crisis Pre-planning Group
authorized contingency mili-
tary planning that included
possible B-52 bomber strikes
on Libya from the United
States, as well as F-111 at-
tacks from England. Predict-
ably, Qaddafi responded to
published reports of Amer-
ican plans by warning that
his nation would "harass
American citizens in their
own streets" if the bombers
came.
e
t
gress, President Reagan au- a series of White House
thorized McFarlane, one aide meetings on Libya, under the
recalls, to get the contras supervision of Poindexter
funded "in any way you can." and Fortier. The two even
North subsequently wrote an made a secret visit to Egypt
internal memorandum out- to coordinate possible joint
lining the shape of much of military operations against
the future N.S.C. activities, Qaddafi.
calling for White House-led By October, the President
fund-raising efforts in the pri- had formally authorized yet
vate community and among another C.I.A. covert opera-
foreign governments. Mean- tion to oust Qaddafi. But, ac-
while, Fortier, relying on raw cording to a report in The
intelligence, was beginning to Washington Post, the Admin-
argue that the Administra- istration was forced to have
tion could make some policy Secretary of State Shultz ap-
moves toward Iran. The pear in secret before the ,
N.S.C. staff began to go House Select Committee on
operational. Intelligence in order to pre-
vent a rare committee veto of
the action. Committee mem-
bers were said to have been
concerned over a top-secret
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the l..i.A. nau ivuaiw o --e ...6 w .,.vr ....
Libyan connection to the air- resist a military response pending a of the N.S.A., whose field stations ring
port attacks, although the Is- "smoking gun" - some evidence link- the globe; but beefed-up coverage
raelis publicly blamed them ing Qaddafi to the airport bombings. was deemed necessary. Interception
on a Palestinian terrorist fac- Another of Mr. Reagan's concerns stations in England, Italy and Cyprus,
tion led by Abu Nidal. A State was that an attack on Libya must ap- among others, were ordered to moni-
Department special report, pear to be a just response. The Joint tor and record all communications
made public early in 1986, Chiefs were known to be reluctant to out of Libya. In the N.S.A. this is
was unable to cite any direct use force as a response to terrorism, known as "cast-iron" coverage. A
connection between Libya and had been resisting White House high-priority special category
and the airport incident. The staff entreaties to move a third air- (SPECAT) clearance was set up for
sole link was that three of the craft carrier into the Mediterranean the traffic, denying most N.S.A. inter-
passports used by the terror- to buttress the two already on patrol. ception stations access to the Libyan
ists in Vienna had been The Joint Chiefs had claimed that at intelligence. A special procedure for
traced to Libya. One had been least three carriers and their strike immediately funneling the intercepts
lost in Libya by a Tunisian la- force would be needed if Libya re- to the White House was established.
borer eight years earlier and sponded to a bombing with its 500 A third American aircraft carrier
two had been seized by fighter aircraft. Adding a third car- arrived in the Mediterranean in mid-
Libyan officials from Tuni- rier to the task force, the Joint Chiefs March, and the three carriers and
sians as they were expelled in explained, would disrupt the schedule their 30-ship escort were sent on an
mid-1985. of leaves for seamen and pilots. One "exercise" into the Gulf of Sidra. It
One involved White House White House aide recalls a tense was the largest penetration by the
aide believes that the basic meeting in which Richard Armitage American fleet into the Libyan-
decision to use military force of the Defense Department declared, claimed waters.
was made at a high-level Na- "Cancel the leaves," only to have the I One involved N.S.C. aide acknowl-
tional Security Planning Joint Chiefs insist that three carriers edges that Poindexter, who had suc-
Group meeting on Jan. 6, could not be on station until March. ceeded McFarlane as national se-
1986, in the emotional after- curity adviser, and Fortier had deter-
math of the airport bomb- SPEAKING AT THE NA- mined that the Navy should respond
ings. All of the key Adminis- tional Defense University at to any loss of American life in the ex-
tration officials attended, in- Fort McNair in Washington on ercise by bombing five targets in
cluding the President, Shultz, Jan. 15, George Shultz argued that the Libya. As the Navy task force sailed
Weinberger, Casey and Poin- United States had a legal right to use toward Libya, the aide remembers,
dexter. military force against states that he overheard Fortier and General
Reviewing his notes of the support terrorism. Under interna- Moellering, the Joint Chiefs' delegate
Jan. 6 meeting, a White tional law, he claimed, "a nation at- to the Crisis Pre-planning Group, dis-
House aide recalls that a tacked by terrorists is permitted to agree on tactics during a meeting in
decision was made to pro- use force to prevent or pre-empt fu- the N.S.C. crisis center. Fortier, the
voke Qaddafi by again send- ture attacks, to seize terrorists or to aide says, asked the general to outline
ing the Navy and its war- rescue its citizens, when no other the Navy's rules of engagement in
planes on patrol in the Gulf of means is available." case Libya responded. "Proportional-
Sidra. Any Libyan response Shultz's statement was part of a ity," the general said.
would be seized upon to jus- carefully constructed scenario. In "They should be disproportionate,"
tify bombing. subsequent weeks, one White House the aide heard Fortier sharply re-
According to this N.S.C. official recalls, State Department spond.
aide, there was talk, inspired lawyers began to prepare an exten- On March 25 and 26, the Sixth Fleet
by a memorandum written by North, sive legal paper arguing, in part, that attacked four Libyan ships, destroy-
Teicher and Stark, of using one of the "in the context of military action ing two of them. Navy aircraft also
Navy's most accurate weapons, the what normally would be considered conducted two raids against a radar
Tomahawk missile, to attack targets murder is not." site on the Libyan coast. There were
in Libya. Libyan air defenses, the Two days after Shultz's speech, the no American casualties and no
White House had been told, were ex- President signed a secret executive Libyan counterattack. The White
cellent and would probably shoot order calling for contacts with Iran House, pressing the advan-
down some American aircraft. The and waiving regulations blocking tage, warned Qaddafi that
Tomahawk, a submarine-launched arms shipments there. Casey was in- any Libyan forces venturing
cruise missile with a range of 500 structed not to inform Congress, as more than 12 miles from
miles, is accurate at that distance to the law provided, because of "se- shore - the international
within one hundred feet of a target. curity risks." The White House was limit recognized by the
The next day, Jan. 7, the President, careening down two dangerous paths. United States - were subject
declaring that there was "irrefuta- to attack.
ble" evidence of Qaddafi's role in the ARLY IN 1986, INTELLI- Qaddafi's failure to rise to
airport attacks, announced economic Egence sources said, the Na- the bait frustrated the N.S.C.
sanctions against Libya, including a tional Reconnaissance Office, staff. One senior State De-
ban on direct import and export the secret group responsible for the partment official acknowl-
trade. The idea, advocated by Forti- procurement and deployment of edges, "Everybody wanted to
er, was "to get economic sanctions America's intelligence and spy satel- beat the hell out of Libya." In-
out of the way so the next time they lites, was ordered to move a signals stead, the fleet was with-
could do more," one involved White intelligence satellite (SIGINT) from drawn after three days in the
House aide recalls. President Rea- its orbit over Poland to North Africa, Gulf of Sidra, two days
gan, the aide adds, may not have been where it could carefully monitor earlier than planned.
fully aware that he was being boxed Libyan communications.
in by an N.S.C. staff that wanted ac-
tion. "We were making an end run on the President," the aide says.
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The basic question for
N.S.C. aides remained: how to
convince the reluctant Presi-
dent that bombing was essen-
tial. In late March, the N.S.A.
intercepted a message from
Tripoli to Libyan agents in
East Berlin, Paris, Belgrade,
Geneva Rome and Madrid
The inevitable leaks came
within hours. One State De-
partment intelligence officer
recalls, upon seeing the inter-
cepts, "It was too good. I
knew it would leak."
On April 7, Richard R. Burt,
the Ambassador to West Ger-
There was nothing in any of
them specifically linking
Qaddafi to the La Belle bomb-
ing. What is more, the disco-
theque was known as a hang-
out for black soldiers, and the
Libyans had never been
known to target blacks or
other minorities.
The normal procedure for
SPECAT intelligence traffic
from Libya is that it be pro-
cessed and evaluated by the
G-6 group at N.S.A. headquar-
ters at Fort Meade, Md., be-
fore being relayed elsewhere.
But the La Belle traffic was
never forwarded to G-6. As of
this month, the April 4 and 5
Libyan intercepts had not
been seen by any of the G-6
experts on North Africa and
the Middle East.
,,The G-6 section branch
and division chiefs didn't
know why it was taken from
them," says an N.S.A official.
"They were bureaucratically
cut out and so they screamed
and yelled."
Another experienced N.S.A.
analyst notes: "There is no
doubt that if you send raw
data to the White House, that
constitutes misuse because
there's nobody there who's
capable of interpreting it."
N.S.A. officials had no choice
if the White House asked for
the intercepts, he says, but
adds, "You screw it up every
time when you do it - and
especially when the raw traf-
fic is translated into English
from a language such as Ara-
bic, that's not commonly
known."
ordering them "to prepare to ' Libyans to the La Belle
carry out the plan." Shortly bombing. Interviewed on the I
before 8 P.M. on April 4, "Today" show, Burt said,
Washington time (April 5 in I "There is very, very clear
Germany), the La Belle disco
in West Berlin was blown up.
Fourteen hours later, the
men in the White House had Berlin repeatedly told news-
their "smoking gun." men that they knew of no evi-
B Y 10 A.M. ON SATUR-
day, April 5, the N.S.A.
had intercepted, decod-
ed, translated from Arabic
and forwarded to the White
House a cable from the
Libyan People's Bureau in
East Berlin to Tripoli stating,
in essence, according to
N.S.C. and State Department
officials, that "We have
something planned that will
make you happy." A few
hours later, a second mes-
sage from East Berlin to
Tripoli came across the top-
secret computer terminals in
the N.S.C. providing the exact
time of the La Belle bombing
and reporting that "an event
occurred. You will be pleased
with the result."
The messages were rushed
to the California White
House, where the President
was spending Easter. The
decision to bomb was made
that afternoon, one former
White House official recalls:
"The same people who
wanted to have a show of
force in late March could now
do it in the context of terror-
ism." The President would no
many, publicly linked the
evidence that there is Libyan
involvement."
Yet police officials in West
dence linking Libya to the dis-
cotheque bombing. One week
after the attack, Manfred
Ganschow, chief of the anti-
terrorist police in Berlin, was
quoted as having "rejected
the assumption that suspi-
cion is concentrated on
Libyan culprits."
Christian Lochte, president
of the Hamburg office of the
Protection of the Constitu-
tion, a domestic intelligence
unit, told a television inter-
viewer five days after the
bombing, "It is a fact that we
do not have any hard evi-
dence, let alone proof, to show
the blame might unequivo-
cally be placed on Libya.
True, I cannot rule out that
Libya, in some way, is re-
sponsible for the attack. But I
must say that such hasty
blame, regarding the two
dreadful attacks at the end of
the year on the Vienna and
Rome airports, for which
Libya had immediately been
made responsible, did not
prove to be correct."
A senior official in Bonn, in-
terviewed last month for this
article, said that the West
German Government contin-
Yet another analyst points
out that Qaddafi was known
to have used personal
couriers in the past - and not
radio or telephone communi-
cation - in his many assas-
sinations and assassination
attempts.
A senior State Department
official who was involved in
the White House delibera-
tions on the Libyan bombing
insists that he and his col-
leagues were satisfied with
the handling of the intercepts.
"There was nothing to sug-
gest that it was not handled in
good faith," he says. "The in-
tercepts did not say La Belle
disco was bombed. They
never identified the site. But
there was a history that the
Libyans were going to mount
an operation in Europe."
longer be, as one aide put it, ued to be "very critical and
"the inhibitor." skeptical" of the American
By Monday, Teicher had intelligence linking Libya to
prepared a discussion paper I the La Belle bombing. The
for a talk at a high-level United States, he said, which
meeting on the proposed has extremely close intelli-
bombing; one key element, a gence ties with West Germa-
firsthand source recalls, was ny, had made a tape of its in-
a proposal that the intercepts tercepts available to German
should be declassified and intelligence, with no change
I made public in a Presidential , in Bonn's attitude.
speech. The idea, the White
House official adds, was to
I again "make an end run on
the President" and prevent
any second thoughts.
Some White House officials
had immediate doubts that
the case against Libya was
clear-cut. The messages had
been delivered by the N.S.A.
to the White House, as direct-
ed, without any analysis.
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T HERE WAS AN AT-
mosphere of cynicism
and disarray within
the National Security Council
as it prepared to bomb Libya
while supplying arms to Iran.
Poindexter was being hailed
in Newsweek as "a cool war-
rior" who "steadies the
N.S.C." But privately, some
security council officials say,
he was feeling overwhelmed,
and would soon be telling
close associates that he
wanted a transfer to the Na-
tional Security Agency. By
April, some N.S.C. insiders,
and reportedly the President,
knew that William Casey had
started undergoing radiation
treatment for prostate can-
cer; his illness was not made
public until December. Don-
ald Fortier also was ex-
tremely ill. He would die of
liver cancer in August.
In the weeks preceding
April 14, Oliver North has
told associates, he became
extremely active in the
Libyan planning. The Joint
Chiefs had decided on a two-
pronged aerial attack, involv-
ing Navy units in the Mediter-
ranean and the F-ill's from
England. But none of the mili-
tary planners wanted to see
American airmen shot down
and paraded around Libya;
and there was concern that
the Navy's A-6 bombers
would be vulnerable to an-
tiaircraft fire. The F-ill's not
only flew much faster - they
would hit the target going 9
miles a minute - but also
had far superior electronic
defense mechanisms to ward
off enemy missiles.
The round-trip from Eng-
land to Libya, over France,
would be about seven hours,
well within the F-111's limits.
Admiral Crowe and the Joint
Chiefs agreed that the F-ill's
would play the lead role in the
attack, buttressed by 12 Navy
A-6's, which were assigned to
bomb an airfield and military
barracks 400 miles east of
Tripoli.
But North has told col-
leagues that he had doubts
about the Air Force's mis-
sion, and they were height-
ened when the French
refused to permit the F-111
overflight. The Air Force was
now confronted with a diffi-
cult assignment against the
strong headwinds of the Bay
of Biscay.
According to an account
given to colleagues, North,
just prior to the bombing,
made a series of suggestions
at a high-level meeting at-
tended by the President,
Poindexter, Crowe and Gen.
Charles A. Gabriel, the Air
Force Chief of Staff. With the
approval of Casey, North had
already interceded with the
Israelis to increase the intel-
ligence available before the
mission. Now he argued for
using a covert Navy SEAL
team, which would surface on
the beach near Qaddafi's tent
and residence and set up a
laser beam that could guide
the American bombs directly
to the main targets. The at-
tacking planes could then
launch their bombs offshore
- out of range of Libyan an-
tiaircraft missiles - and be
just as effective. The SEAL
team, apparently at North's
direction, had already been
deployed to the Middle East..
But, North told colleagues,
Crowe said no - that no one
wanted to put Americans at
risk.
North reportedly then
raised the issue of using the
Air Force's most-advanced
fighter-bomber, the superse-
cret Stealth, said to be capa-
ble of avoiding enemy radar.
The aircraft would be perfect
to attack Qaddafi's personal
quarters and tent; it could be
ferried to the huge American
naval base at Rota, Spain,
and attack from there. Admi-
ral Crowe again said no, ex-
plaining that the Stealth tech-
nology was too valuable to
risk.
North told colleagues that
he persisted in seeking alter-
natives, raising the possibil-
ity of attacking the Qaddafi
quarters with a convention-
ally armed Tomahawk cruise
missile fired from a subma-
rine. Admiral Crowe, the re-
port goes, responded that
there were too few conven-
tionally armed Tomahawks
in the arsenal. North has
claimed that he then raised
the possibility of supplement-
ing the bombing by mining
and quarantining the har-
bors, saying he wanted "a far
more sophisticated scenario
to cover up the fact that the
target was going to be an as-
sassination."
The President sided with
the Joint Chiefs Chairman,
North told colleagues. At the
close of the meeting, with the
President out of hearing,
North related, Crowe walked
up to him, and nose to nose
warned: "Young man, you'd
better watch your step."
Through an aide, Crowe
denies the encounter, saying
that he "did not recall any
discussion on substantive
matters that he ever had"
with North. "Nor does he re-
call any meetings with North
except as a back-bench note
taker" at White House meet-
ings, the aide said. Further-
more, Crowe was quoted by
an aide as saying, "He doesn't
recall North having any input
at all in the April raid."
N A NATIONALLY
I televised speech on April
14, President Reagan said
the intelligence linking Libya
to the La Belle bombing "is
direct, it is precise, it is ir-
refutable. We have solid evi-
dence about other attacks
Qaddafi has planned." He de-
scribed the Tripoli raid as a
"series of strikes against the
headquarters, terrorist fa-
cilities and military assets
that support Muammar Qad-
dafi's subversive activities."
The President added "We
Americans are slow to anger.
We always seek peaceful ave-
nues before resorting to the
use of force, and we did. We
tried quiet diplomacy, public
condemnation, economic
sanctions and demonstra-
tions of military force - and
none succeeded."
According to one involved
N.S.C. official, there was
other language prepared for
the President - a few para-
graphs bracketed into the
text in case the White House
could confirm that Qaddafi
had been killed. The message
would echo an analysis pre-
pared by Abraham D. Sofaer,
the State Department legal
adviser, claiming that the
United States had the legal
right "to strike back to pre-
vent future attacks." The kill-
ing of Qaddafi, under that
doctrine, was not retaliation
nor was it in any way a crime.
But Qaddafi was not killed,
and a White House official re-
counts an elaborate briefing
a day or so after the raid at
which the Air Force's failure
conftwd
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to accomplish its mission was
obvious. "The Navy people
were at ease, confident," the
aide recalls. "All had worked
perfectly." The Navy's two
main targets had been accu-
rately attacked, with no loss.
"The poor Air Force guy," re-
calls the aide. "He was defen-
sive and polite. Talked about
how the White House kept on
changing signals."
The intelligence satellite
that had been moved from
Poland was ordered to re-
main over Libya, in the hope
that the bombing would rally
those military men opposed
to Qaddafi and spark a revolt.
.,They honestly thought Qad-
dafi would fall or be over-
thrown,' one National Se-
curity Agency official says,
referring to the N.S.C, "and
so they kept the bird up
there."
There was no coup d'etat -
and there was one intelli-
gence satellite missing over
Eastern Europe in late April,
when an explosion rocked one
of the reactors at the Soviet
nuclear power plant in Cher-
nobyl, in the Ukraine. After
another bureaucratic battle
inside the intelligence com-
munity, one N.S.A. official re-
calls, the satellite was re-
turned to its normal orbit
above Poland, as the United
States tried to unravel the ex-
tent of damage to the nuclear
power plant and the scope of
the fallout threat to Western
Europe.
The White House's two-
track policy toward Libya
and Iran continued. In May,
McFarlane, accompanied by
North and Teicher, among
others, traveled to Teheran
bearing arms. A few weeks
later, Poindexter routinely
approved a proposal,
strongly supported by Casey
and Shultz, calling for an-
other disinformation opera-
tion against Libya in the
hopes of provoking Qaddafi.
The C.I.A. triggered the re-
newed planning, one insider
recalls, by reporting once
again that "Qaddafi was on
the ropes."
In September, there was a
second visit by American of-
ficials to Iran, and continued
arms trading. Within a month
the policy - and the National
Security Council - began to
come apart. By early Novem-
ber, the Iran scandal was on
the front pages. Its major
casualty was the credibility
of a popular President.
In the wake of that scandal,
Oliver North would emerge
in the public's perception as a
unique and extraordinary
player inside the National Se-
curity Council, a hard-charg-
ing risk-taker who was differ-
ent from his colleagues. It is
now apparent that North was
but one of many at work in
the White House who believed
in force, stealth and opera-
tions behind the back of the
citizenry and the Congress.
He was not an aberration, but
part of a White House team
whose full scope of opera-
tions has yet to be unraveled.
North, along with Poindex-
ter, Teicher and others, have
left the Government. The
much-reviled Colonel Qad-
dafi remains in power. ^
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