IRAN-IRAQ WAR

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP90-00965R000504140012-8
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 2
• Document Creation Date: December 22, 2016
• Document Release Date: January 20, 2012
• Sequence Number: 12
• Publication Date: April 2, 1985
• Content Type: OPEN SOURCE

STAT ? _ _ 1.O1 n AI Li,ii4'
Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2012/01/20: CIA-RDP90-00965R000504140012-8
7 Pm . _
words for President Suazo, the
man who charged Valladares with
treason.
RAMON VALLADARES: Let me
say that now he is a dictator-
ship. He is exercising a
dictatorship in this country.
That's what we think.
VON FREMD: So there's no
longer democratic rule in
Honduras.
VALLADARES: I should say
there's not.
VON FREMD: Armed troops
surround the court and Con-
gress, as they have since last
Thursday, when Congress voted
to throw out the old Supreme
Court, which was considered a
political tool of President
Suazo. Today, in an emergency
session of Congress, members
who voted against the Suazo
Supreme Court learned that the
President has now taken action
to have them indicted.
ROBERT CANTERO: He's trying
to throw us in jail, like the
President of the Supreme Court.
VON FREMD: The U.S.
Ambassador here went to the
presidential palace this
afternoon for an explanation.
And American officials are
making known their displeasure
over the worsening constitu-
tional crisis.
Honduran military officials
have told the U.S. they will
not attempt to settle things by
staging a coup. But whatever
the outcome, the Reagan
Administration is going to find
it harder to point to Honduras
as a shining example of
democracy along the border with
Nicaragua.
Iran-Iraq War
KOPPEL: Iran and Iraq
launched air raids against each
other again today. These new
air raids are different from
earlier ones in the long and
bloody war. The targets now
are civilian population centers
inside both countries.
More from ABC's John
McWethy.
JOHN MCWETHY: Iraq, using
its superior air force, is now
bombing cities in Iran almost
daily, including repeated
strikes on the capital,
Teheran. One earlier today,
according to Iranian officials,
killed 18 in a residential
neighborhood.
Iran claims that Iraqi
fighter planes are using a
tactic of hidinq in the radar
shadows of the few civilian
flights still coming into
Teheran, flying close to the
passenger planes so that ground
radar has trouble distinguish-
ing them and antiaircraft
batteries dare not
fear of hitting
shoot, for
the wrong
plane.
U.S. intelligence
sources
say both Iraq and
ran
a
re now
hitting cities in an
eff
ort to
demoralize each
o
ther s
populations. But wi
suc a
tactic, begun by Iraq's
Saddam
Hussein, wor against ran
s
Ayatollah Khomeini?
HILHARD
LM
: I
think
it
will make
him
all
the more
stubborn.
As you
well
know,
he
thinks he
got the Shah.
He
thinks he
got
Jimmy
Carter.
And he certainly wants to get
Saddam Hussein. And until he
gets his head on a platter, I
don't think he intends to allow
the war to end.
MCWETHY: Iran, because it
cannot get parts for its
American-made planes, no longer
has an air force capable of
sustained air strikes. As an
alternative, Iran is using
artillery on cities close to
the border, and, according to
U.S. intelligence sources, has
purchased Soviet-made Scud
missiles from Libya to strike
at population centers deep
inside Iraq. The missile has a
3 Tuesday, April 2, 1985
Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2012/01/20: CIA-RDP90-00965R000504140012-8
 Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2012/01/20: CIA-RDP90-00965R000504140012-8
range of 100 to 150 miles.
American intelligence sources
say, however, they doubt Iran
has more than several dozen.
More than a quarter of a
million combatants have been
killed in. this war. There have
been mass suicide attacks, use
of chemical weapons, and now
the civilians are under the
gun, the latest victims of a
war that has had few equals in
sheer brutality.
Vietnamese Celebration
KOPPEL: This month marks
the tenth anniversary of the
fall of South Vietnam. It has
been a time of c lebration for
the people of Viet am.
ABC's Jim Lauri has been
there on special as ignment.
Last week he obser d the
celebration in the city o?` Hue.
JIM LAURIE: The T-54 tanks
ru_mbled past the old Imperial
Citadel. It was only a few
city blocks from here in 1968`,
where 150 U.S. Marines lost
their lives retaking Hue from
the Communists. Communist
Vietnam, ten years since, as
they put it, the complete
liberation of Hue, were staging
a victory parade. The militar%
display was a modest one,
considering that Vietnam still
has the fourth-largest army in;
the world and spends 30 percent'
of its national income on
Looking on was Vietnam's top
leader, Party Secretary .-'Le
Duan, flanked by the Soviet
Ambassador and military vet;+eran
Vo Nguyen Giap, backed by a
Cuban military attache.
Much of the celebration was
not military, though; rather,
an attempt to put a happy face
on Vietnam at peace, ani attempt
to erase the painful images of
the fall of South Vietnam ten
years ago.
With the victory here at Hue
ten years ago, a quarter of the
Vietnam had fallen to the
Communists. In a matter of 35
more days, the rest of Vietnam
fell.
As in most of the victories
being celebrated t is month,
there was not muc resistance
in Hue in 1975, b t there was
much panic. Fearing for their
lives, more than/125,000 people
fled the city y boat. There
are boat peopl/in Hue today in
the city's ' famous Perfume
River. BuX in the holiday
spirit now!, they're intent on
racing, not' escaping. Vietnam
seeking to portray a happier
image ten years later.
CBS EVENING NEWS CBS-TV
7:00:P.M. APRIL 1
Iran-Iraq War
DAN RATHER: There was an
increasingly familiar sight
over the Iranian capital of
Teheran today: Iraqi warplanes
on the attack. And as Tom
Fenton in London tells us, the
'attackers found their target.
TOM FENTON: It was 1:30
this morning when more than 20
hous'e,s in South Teheran were
blasted by rockets from two
Iraqi w''arplanes. The inhabi-
tants had, ,,,only a minute or two
of warni"' q. At least 22
persons were killed and close
to a hundre ,injured. Most of
the air raids n the capital in
the past thrtie weeks have
concentrated or'r, these over-
crowded slum areas where
support for the war is still
strongest.
A few hours later-,,today, the
people of Teheran were out on
the streets celebr-ating a
patriotic holiday and donating
money for the war effort,.
Iran has been retaliating by
4 Tuesday, April 2, 1985
Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2012/01/20: CIA-RDP90-00965R000504140012-8