EMBASSY DEATHS CALLED BLOW TO CIA

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP91-00901R000500150024-4
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 2
• Document Creation Date: December 19, 2016
• Document Release Date: December 20, 2005
• Sequence Number: 24
• Publication Date: April 27, 1983
• Content Type: NSPR

Approved For Release 2006/01/12: CIA-RDP91-00901R0
PHILADELPHIA INQUIRER
Embassy deaths cam
By Frank Greve .
1n9uur, '.ashMgmn Sw'euu
WASHINGTON - The terrorist
bombing of the U.S. Embassy in Bei
rut virtually wiped out the CIA's key
station in the Middle East, a congres-
sional intelligence specialist on the
Middle East said yesterday.-
As -many as nine.'American . CIA
agents.-and support 'staff spersonnel .
perished. in the Apri1.18.attack,-the
most ' devastating' in -CIA history;-ac--.
cording to agency sources. Key Leba-
~neae sources also are believed' to
have died.
"The loss would have been less af.
they'd 'gotten Habib and Draper,"
said the intelligence specialist, refer-
ring to special US envoy Philip C.
Habit' and his assistant. Morris Drap-
er. A senior White House official
yesterday agreed that the CIA opera-.
tion in Beirut was practically de-
stroyed with the deaths of its person-
nel.
Officially, the CL-% acknowledges
only one death, that of Robert Clay-
ton Ames, 49. who was director of the
agency's office of Analysis for the
Near East and South Asia.. Ames. ?a
Philadelphia native, had served with
high visibility as a Middle East ex-
,pert in the Carter and Reagan admin-
istrations. Secretary of State George
P. Shultz and. his .predecessor, Alex-
ander M. Haig Jr.,_ both considered
Ames a key analyst, and he personal=
ly. briefed President Reagan on Leba.
Pon n-a month ago.
Ames, making his first official visit
to Beirut in five years, arrived there
April 17 and apparently was meeting
-with CIA personnel',at 1:02 pzLPei-
rut time, wheii the blast occurred.
The group had convened ?on as :high
-floor in a position directly above the
site where more than 300 pounds of
explosives were detonated. At,least
49-people, including 17 Americans,
' were killed at the embassy., -
? _..The timing and precision of the
attack have led to speculation in the,
intelligence-,community, that Ames
and his colleagues were targets of
the terrorists. A White House offi-
cial, who said be had reviewed cable
traffic relating to the explosion, r6-
jetted that theory, however.
The Muslim Holy War. which
claimed responsibi)iity for the bomb-
ing. is an underground group of Shi-
ite Muslim fundamentalists in Leba-
non who support lranian; ':leader
Ayatollah" 2tihdllah dibumeini rand
are vying lto'toment aniranian-style`
revolution in Lebanon.,
Ames, who served Richard Helms
when he was US, ambassador to Iran
and who later advised the Carter
,administration on,the lrau hostages,'
would have been a prize target for
the group.
Initial reports in the Lebanese
press said that both Habib and Drap-
er would have been in the embassy
at the time of the blast had they not
been delayed at the Lebanese presi-
dential palace in Baabde. Habib and
U.S Ambassador Robert Dillon, him-
self slightly wounded in the explo-
sion, have since denied the reports.
The first suggestion that CIA per-
sonnel other than Ames might have
died in the attack emerged last week
when the State Department offered
only terse, gap-filled biographies of
many victims. Traditionally, such
vague biographies have been indica?
tors of CIA employment.
Because many of the slain employ-
ees had worked as diplomats and
representali ves of o; .er U.S'govern-
ment agencies, identifying them
would cause great political embar-
rassment and gravely endanger
sources and operatives. And because
it fears such a result, the CIA tradi-
tionally has declined toidentify .per-
sonnel killed in the line of duty. This
proved, however, to be an impossible
task in the wake of the highly publi-
cized bombing in Beirut.
To afford CIA and other intelli-
gence agents further protection,
Congress has made it illegal .10 dis-
close their identities in the press.
The exception -- Ames - was too,
widely known not to be linkedto the
agency.
Lebanese victims of the embassy
attack also have been only vaguely
and belatedly identified by U.S.
many intelligence experts to -co
elude that -key Lebanese sources, ,
-well as the American operatives, mi
yj,
have perished.
Among CIA officials. seven is the;
lowest estimate of agency dead, wihtwo sources putting the n amber at
nine. In 36 years of operation, there.
have never been ? as-'many'CIA em-.
?TloyeesVdlled'in"a single- adccideixt;".
'-officials said. Before last 'weep's
deaths; only 38 intelligence-officers
bad been killed in the agency's -histow
Approved For Release 2006/01/12 : CIA-RDP91-00901 R000500150024-4
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STAT
:surprising that the bizarre relation-
ship between the Carter adminis-
plained.
:tRration icharchard He anelms is former left CIA unexplained.
history by
is important because Helms
This
.'dime-store was given a pas by Carter on a
12-count perjury indictment over
-lies he told Congress about the de-
~+ ~+~ "Stabilization of Chile by the CIA.
l~?lel After plea bargaining and getting
two years probation, Helms ended
up as an adviser to Carter on Iran.
"Power and Principle," by 2big- since Helms and the Shah attended
view Brzezinski. Farrar, Straus and prep school together and Helms
-Giroux, S22.50 was paying off his legal bills by
felling-his influence with the Shah
s Considering Brzezinskisi
:tised candor on Iran, it is especially
:1.o American companies, it might
have been nice to know what advice
Helms gave Carter on Iran.
Brzezinski, the dime store Henry But the most notable absence in
Kissinger .of the Carter presidency, this convenient history is discussion
has brought us his memoirs. The of the role Brzezinski played in the
:587-page book seems almost as long -Billy Carter scandal.
as that administration's time in Billy's real difficulties started
.power. =after National Security Agency
The reader must plow through a ;chief Bobby Ray Inman took inter-
.writing style that makes Jerry . cepts to the Justice Department
Ford seem like Hemingway. He is that showed Billy had gotten hun-
-rewarded with Brzezinski's denial dreds of thousands of dollars from
The best sections, on Iran and the
.Camp David meetings, are infor-
mative, as far as they go. Nothing
new, really, just a fairly straight-
-forward history without the previ-
ous hand-wringing we got from
:Carter's own memoirs.
The book is homogenized. It deals
.not a whit with the dirty games
:of real-life global politics. It
.ignores the fact that the Carter
,administration had some king-sized
.skeletons loitering in White House
closets.
-national security adviser to secre-
?tary of state and little useful infor-
.mation.
that he wanted to move from the Libyans. Brzeztnski saw those
"-intercepts. yet he writes not a word
about the affair.
Brzezinski either managed to
..miss a great deal, or has developed
an exaggerated sense of discretion
that should endear him to Mr. and
Mrs. Carter, if not the poor souls
:who shell out $22.50 for his tome.
Joe Tr-ento is a former reporter
:for the News-Journal papers who
-recently took a job with the Cable
.News Network in Washington.
Approved For Release 2006/01/12 : CIA-RDP91-00901 R000500150024-4
By JOE TRENTO