THE GREAT MINING PANIC

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP91-00561R000100020116-1
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 1
• Document Creation Date: December 22, 2016
• Document Release Date: February 17, 2012
• Sequence Number: 116
• Publication Date: April 15, 1984
• Content Type: OPEN SOURCE

' Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2012/02/17: CIA-RDP91-00561 R000100020116-1
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DETROIT NEWS
15 April 1984
The Great Mining Panic
Nicaragua sent a formal message of
thanks and commendation to the
U.S. Senate last week when the latter
lost its cool and shouted through a resolution
condemning the mining of Nicaraguan har-
bors. We at least hope that this bit of
Sandinista solicitousness caused a few mem-
bers of the World's Greatest Deliberative
Body to have some second thoughts, but we
doubt it.
Congress generally acted as if the mining
was a great and shocking surprise. But as our
solons love to demand of others, what did they
know and when did they know it?
The Nicaraguan "contras" fighting with
some CIA help against the Marxist regime
publicly announced in January that they
planned to mine the harbor. The action, they
said, was intended to disrupt Cuban and
Russian arms shipments to the Sandinistas.
Ocean shipping insurers began to raise rates.
Seven ships, including a Soviet vessel, subse-
quently were damaged. This was duly reported
in the newspapers.
So the mining itself was hardly a dastardly
plot unknown to shippers or others who might
be affected by it. Within the U.S. government,
it was no case of a "rogue CIA" running out of
control, either. President Reagan approved
the involvement several months ago, as he is
required by law to do. The House Intelligence
Committee was briefed in full about it more
recently. The staff of the Senate Intelligence
Committee received a full briefing two weeks
agu. A member of the Senate committee,
Barry Goldwater, expressed outrage that he
hadn't been told about the operation, but the
fault was his staff's, which apparently failed to
brief him on the briefing. Sen. Moynihan says
he thinks he may have been told about the
mining, but confesses he didn't pay much
attention at the time.
So a lot was known about the mining well
before it was blown into a big issue. Indeed, it
became an issue precisely because so much
was known by our senators and congressmen.
The details, it's now clear, were leaked to the
press by congressional committee sources in
ways calculated to create maximum political
panic.
The leaks followed a. pattern that has
become a - familiar pattern since Congress
gained increased "oversight" power over intel-
ligence activities in the early 1970s. Dozens of
Capitol Hill denizens with intense partisan
interests now have access to the highest and
"dirtiest" secrets of the republic. Armed with
such information, they cannot resist scoring
political points by revealing choice details
that seem at first blush embarrassing to their
opponents.
Whatever you think of plopping mines into
Nicaragua's harbors, leaks are a lousy way to
run a government. They make life very risky
for our friends, who can never be sure when
some ambitious young aide on Capitol Hill
will stab them in the back. The practice also
weakens our own ability to encourage proxy
groups to take small-scale action in the hopes
of averting bloodier confrontation by our own
forces in the future.
As it stands, we see no evidence that the
United States violated international law. It
helped train and supply the "contras," but it
didn't actually sow the mines. And if that's a
violation of 'some ethical or moral code, it
must be a pretty selective code. Cuban, Soviet,
and Sandinistan efforts to train and arm
gunmen of their own throughout Latin Ameri-
ca don't seem to have brought forth the same
sense of outrage. Where was this sense of high
dudgeon when Marxist-led thugs in El Salva-
dor tried to disrupt the recent elections there?
Congress, basking in 'compliments from
Nicaragua's new dictators - true connois-
seurs of selective outrage - is now poised to
return the favor by killing a $21-million
appropriation for the "contras." Never mind
that Nicaragua last year received $90 million
in military equipment - that we could count
- mostly from Cuba and Russia. ' Edward
Kennedy. and Co. are talking about Moral
Principles!
Last week's vote won't likely go down as
one of Congress' finer moments. We,well may
have cause to regret the political panic the
leakers have created. Before exulting in this
embarrassment of the Reagan administration,
"progressives" might want to remember an-
other resolution whooped through Congress in
1966 - the Gulf of Tonkin resolution, which
gave Lyndon Johnson free rein to widen the
Vietnam War. Congress should move quickly
to prevent further damage by making it clear
to our friends that we aren't going to cut and
run. Then, to back good words with sound
deeds, the solons should amend a congressio-
nal oversight process that has run amok.
STAT
Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2012/02/17: CIA-RDP91-00561 R000100020116-1