SECURITY COUNCIL EXPANDING ROLE IN CONTRA WAR

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP90-00965R000402970004-9
• Release Decision: RIFPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 2
• Document Creation Date: December 22, 2016
• Document Release Date: February 8, 2012
• Sequence Number: 4
• Publication Date: October 19, 1986
• Content Type: OPEN SOURCE

Declassified and Approved For Release 2012/02/08: CIA-RDP90-00965R000402970004-9
ON PAGE
CHICAGO TRIBUNE
19 October 1986
perspecti
ve
Security council
ex anding role
p
in contra war
By Nicholas M. Horrock
W ASHINGTON-In June, 1984, when Congress
barred the Central Intelligence Agency from
continued involvement in the angry little war
against the Sandinista government of Nicaragua, the
Reagan administration was faced with a dilemma.
It had some 15,000 "freedom fighters" in the field, a
force larger than a U.S. Army division, that it wanted to
arm, feed, clothe, train and direct in battle until
President Reagan could get Congress to approve further
military and CIA aid. Although Congress finally has
voted $100 million in such aid, the money has yet to be
delivered.
What has been emerging slowly in the intervening 27
months is evidence of an astounding story of how a
determined president has run an extensive jungle war
from the offices of his National Security Council. The
whole story may not be known until Reagan leaves
office, if then, but even what already is on the record is
an intriguing picture of an unusual role for the
supersecret NSC.
After the CIA funds were cut off, the leaders of the
main "contra" rebel group began to talk of getting their
support from a group of private citizens in the U.S.
Among the support groups have been the World Anti-
Communist League and the United States Council for
World Freedom, both directed by John K. Singlaub, a
retired Army general.
Singlaub was linked in news accounts to the flight of a
C-123 K Fairchild cargo plane shot down by a Soviet-
made missile two weeks ago in Nicaragua. He has
denied involvement.
The Sandinistas claim the C-123 was making weapons
airdrops to anti-government forces in southern
Nicaragua. They are holding Eugene Hasenfus, an
American who parachuted from the olane: two other
Americans and another unidentified man also aboard
the plane died in the crash.
Hasenfus has said he thought he had been engaged by
the CIA as a cargo handler on the flights. Nicaragua
says it intends to place him on trial Monday on charges
of supplying weapons and ammunition to the contras
for the CIA.
The Reagan administration has tended to put forth a
notion that a few private groups could raise the vast
amounts of money and support to find a venture the
size of the contra initiative.
Even during the months of reduced activity, the
contras require extensive assistance. They needed food
and clothes for not only the fighting men, but for what
has been estimated at another 15,000 non-combatants,
families and relatives of the field soldiers. They also
needed ammunition for a wide range of weapons,
replacement arms, intelligence data from the U.S.'s vast
resources that include overflights of Nicaragua, aircraft,
petroleum for aircraft and ground vehicles, to name just
a partial fist.
Congressional investigators from the beginning have
suspected that the private funds never have come close
to filling these demands. They suspect, but cannot
prove, that several foreign nations-Israel often is
mentioned as one of them-have extended assistance to
the contras. Israel consistently denies the allegation.
This foreign assistance, the congressional detectives
suspect, will be repaid by the U.S. to the contributing
countries through eased terms on their military and
foreign aid payments. The aid, they suspect, often has
been routed through the private American groups to
give it the appearance of coming from civilian
donations.
Even after the U.S. government's official withdrawal
from directing the war, members of the NSC staff
seemed to have extensive information on contra
activities. Constantine Menges, a former CIA official;
Jackie Tillman, one-time aide to Ambassador Jeane
Kirkpatrick, and Marine U. Col. Oliver North were
among those on the NSC who could impart a lot of
details to reporters, if they chose to do so.
In August, 1985, North was accused by several
administration sources, who asked not to be identified,
of maintaining "liaison" with the contras. Adolpho
Calero, a civilian leader of united anti-Sandinista forces,
later acknowledged that North had made two trips to
Honduras and had arranged meetings for the contra
leaders with Reagan.
But when congressional investigators tried to delve
further into the case, they met, as one Senate aide called
it, "a stone wall." Part of the stone wall relies upon the
unique role of the NSC. Unlike other executive branch
employees, members of the White House staff-and
North holds that status-cannot easily be compelled to
testify before congressional committees.
North has been connected to Robert Owen, a young
activist who once worked in Washington, D.C. for the
politically connected public relations firm of Robert
Gray and Co. News accounts earlier this year cited
Owen as being the conduit for plans and assistance
between private groups, such as the ones run by Gen.
Singlaub, and North.
Owen's business card was found on the body of one
of the Americans who died in the C-123 crash.
Shortly after his capture, Hasenfus told the Sandinista
government he was working for a man named Max
Gomez, a former CIA official. Hasenfus claimed Gomez
often boasted he had connections with Vice President
George Bush.
Bush has denied running the operations, but
acknowledged knowing Gomez through his aide for
national security, Donald Gregg.
Like North, Gregg is an assistant on the NSC and
cannot easily be brought before Congress to tell his full
role. He told The Tribune last week that he did know
Gomez. Gregg came to the White House during
President Jimmy Carter's term after completing a full
career in the CIA. He was involved in one of most
Declassified and Approved For Release 2012/02/08: CIA-RDP90-00965R000402970004-9
 Declassified and Approved For Release 2012/02/08: CIA-RDP90-00965R000402970004-9
famous CIA airdrop-campaigns
when groups of agents were
dropped into Manchuria and
Korth Korea during the Korean
War.
Gregg later served in Korea as
station chief, the senior CIA man
in the country, and knew Gen.
Singlaub, as well as Gomez.
M nothing else about this affair
yet is established fully, it is clear
that Ronald Reagan is taking the
NSC to a new dimension of
activism.
Only a few days before the C.
123 went down, the NSC was
identified as the source of a plan
to destabilize Libyan leader
Moammar Gadhafi, part of this
plan, according to the Washington
Post, included giving the press
misinformation that suggested
Libya faced imminent attack from
the U.S. and that Gadhafi's regime
was shaken by unrest.
The NSC was
and formed in 1947,
gained power and prominence
as center for American policy
under President Dwight
E
isenhower. It was conceived as a
Sort
where a"war cabinet," a place
independ '
ent s advice and counselck
on national security that was not
encumbered by bureaucratic
prerogatives,
Fifteen years later, however,
President Richard Nixon and his
national security adviser. Henrv
Kissinger, used the NSC to bypass
the State Department and open
secret negotiations with China and
North Vietnam.
Kissinger's unusually secret and
direct relationship with the
president, it later was charged,
spurred a military spying
operation in the White House to
supply Kissinger's private
memorandums to Admiral
Thomas Moorer, then chairman of
the Joint Chiefs of Staff
A Young Navy yeoman serving
as an NSC clerk was accused of
stealing the material, but senior
Navy officers denied instructing
him to do so.
At the same time, Nixon's secret
maneuvers also were slipping into
public print, and the President
appointed several aides as
"plumbers"-E. Howard Hunt
and G. Gordon Liddy-to stop
those leaks. A year later, they
broke into the Democratic
headquarters at the Watergate and
ended Nixon's Presidency.
The reason presidents are drawn
to the NSC is that it provides
secrecy and can elude the hand
and eye of opponents in Congress.
But there are some uncomfortable
historical questions being raised by
the NSC and the war in
Nicaragua.
Cumbersome as it may appear
to an active president, his power
to declare war and involve the
nation in a foreign adventure was
tempered by Congress' power to
control the purse strings. If
Ronald Reagan has found a way
to conduct a foreign war using
NSC staff officers and loans
against future appropriations, he
may open the door to a realm of
uncontrolled presidential power
even he would be uncomfortable
with.
Declassified and Approved For Release 2012/02/08: CIA-RDP90-00965R000402970004-9